


Becoming Us (A reunion in three parts)

by addicted2hugh



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angelo Ships It, Angst, Awesome Mrs Hudson, Bottom Sherlock, Drug Addiction, First Time, Fluff and Smut, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Grief/Mourning, Hurt Sherlock, Hurt/Comfort, I Guess There's A Bit Of Parentlock As Well, John Are You Shipping It Too?, John Watson Has A Secret, John Watson Swears a Lot, John is a Bit Not Good, M/M, Mary Ships It, POV Sherlock Holmes, Pining Sherlock, Post-Season/Series 04, Protective John, Self-Harm, Sherlock (TV) Season/Series 04 Fix-it, Sherlock Holmes and John Watson Reunion, Sherlock is a Mess, The last chapter is really long, Top John, Virgin Sherlock, Why Doesn't EVERYONE Ship It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-25
Updated: 2018-05-06
Packaged: 2019-04-27 09:54:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 23,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14422905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/addicted2hugh/pseuds/addicted2hugh
Summary: After watching Mary's last message, Sherlock and John try to be the "Baker Street Boys" again. Rebuilding the destroyed flat is the easy part. Will they manage to rebuild their friendship as well? And what did Mary mean when she said: "And if I'm gone, I know what you could become."?Warning: Mentions of violence, drug addiction, and self-harm.





	1. Partners

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Español available: [Becoming Us (Una reunión en tres partes)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15539916) by [addicted2hugh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/addicted2hugh/pseuds/addicted2hugh), [Altariel_de_Valinor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Altariel_de_Valinor/pseuds/Altariel_de_Valinor)



It sounded so easy when Mary said it.

“My Baker Street Boys - Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson.”

That was three months ago, and by now I can safely say that it isn’t easy at all.

Sure, now that we’ve rebuilt the flat, we’re working again, and him coming back is probably the best thing that could have happened to me after everything I did to him. After everything I put him through. I know I should be thankful. I know these things take time.

In spite of that, I sometimes find myself wondering whether it will ever get back to how it was before our lives went off the rails. Shooting the wall again was childish fun, exhilarating even, and I gave in to the treacherous hope that we could fix it, just like that. But replacing the carpet will not bring back the days we spent pacing these rooms, always on the hunt for a new adventure, and putting up a new mirror over the fireplace doesn’t mean it’s the old us we’ll see when we look into it. Spraying a new smiley face on the wall will not make this the flat we shared – it’s still just the space that holds the memory of what we used to be.

And me.

I live with the ghosts of our past, and whenever he leaves to go home, I either go and pester Lestrade to give me a case, a riddle, _something_ to distract me, or I go to my mind palace. I can’t relapse as long as I’m in there, and by now Mrs Hudson has gotten used to finding me lying on the floor, motionless and completely out of it, and doesn’t scream anymore because she thinks I’ve OD’d.

Don’t get me wrong – I’d never trade this, this thing we have now, for working on my own again. This, whatever it is, is better than not having him in my life. _Anything_ would be better than that. I don’t care that his eyes are so often cold and empty when we’re alone – at least he’s looking at me. I don’t care that he never smiles – it’s too early in his grief. And I don’t care that he goes through my things once a week to look for drugs – that only means he cares.

Doesn’t it?

It doesn’t matter that this partnership we have, if you can call it that, is so much less than I really want. I’ve wanted so much more for such a long time, but I missed my chance (if there ever was one), and I only have myself to blame for that. I never wanted to stay away for two years. I never wanted him to see me jump – I wish he had stayed with Mrs Hudson that day. I wanted to contact him, but there was no way to do so without endangering his life, and the longer I was away, the more the whole thing went out of control. I went in too deep, and I paid the price for that.

If Mycroft hadn’t found me, I’d be dead now. And what happened in Serbia is yet another reason why I’ll never get what I dream of at night. I’m not _whole_ anymore, and even if he ever looked at me like that, he’d never like what I’ve become. I'll always carry the marks of what others (and then, afterwards, I myself) did to my body. I’m broken. I’m ugly.

I wonder why I even bother myself with thoughts like these – he’s stressed time and time again that he’s not interested. He’s not _like that_. I just can’t help imagining what could, what _might_ have been if I hadn’t left. Maybe one day he’d have woken up in the morning and we’d have met in the kitchen to have a cup of tea, and I’d have made some joke or other, and he’d have laughed and looked into my eyes and suddenly realised that maybe, just _maybe_ , there could be more.

If it's been a good day, and if I'm not distracted, I can make mind palace John do _things_ to me. I only ever do that at night, because I don't want Mrs Hudson to get scarred for life. It even disgusts myself when I come to and either find myself hard and throbbing and _desperate_ for my own touch to take the ache away, or, more seldom, with my clothes soiled by the evidence of my desire for a person that doesn't exist in the real world.  

I despise myself for being so irrational. He’s a weakness I’m addicted to, and nothing could get rid of that, because I want to keep it even though I hate it, hate it, _hate_ it.

Coming back to find him proposing to Mary made the ground fall out from underneath my feet, but I tried to mask it by being irritating. That always works.

By the time we made up, I’d more or less successfully forced myself to accept this turn of events – I should never have assumed he’d wait for me. My hubris had always protected me from being hurt before, but then, as soon as John stepped into my life, it led to my downfall. I only noticed when it was much too late, which is entirely my own fault.

At least I was his friend again. His best friend, even.

And his best man.

The wedding put me to the test in various ways, but I think I managed to get through it all with my pride intact. He’ll never know how I wanted to run from the room as they danced. Even while I played for them, my heart broke over and over again whenever I saw them share a quiet word, a loving smile, a tender touch.

Maybe he’d even be appalled by me if he knew that I wish _I_ could touch him, just once. Just one night to experience what I’ve never experienced before. I know I’ll die without knowing what it’s like, because if it isn’t him, it’s no one. I’ve never wanted it to happen before I met him, and I know there won’t be another one to make me feel like this. There couldn’t be. He’s one of a kind. I’m a machine, and he’s my systemic error.

But it’s alright. I’ll take whatever he’s willing to give.

Right now it’s good, because Rosie is here as well, and with her in the room, he’s always different. He’s laughing as I rock her on my lap, humming that silly nursery rhyme Mummy used to sing to me when I was a boy.

I steal looks whenever I can, because he’s beautiful. I feel guilty for using him like that, but I can’t stop.

Rosie gurgles happily and gives me a mostly toothless grin, and I feel my heart swell in my chest. This little human is a part of him, a miracle. And it’s because of her that I get to see him like this; it’s because of her that I am able to bask in the warmth of his good mood, pretending for an hour or two that this is what we are.

Still friends.

This time, it’s over much too soon.

\---

His phone rings. I’m in the kitchen, making tea for the two of us, so I can’t make out who’s calling or what he’s saying, but he seems to be upset. He sticks his head through the door a moment later.

“I’ve got to go, Sherlock. I’m sorry about the tea.”

He _sounds_ sorry. Or maybe just worried. I put the kettle back on the stove and breathe in the zesty aroma of bubbling tea leaves. I made Lady Grey. His favourite.

“Is everything alright?” I ask.

He shrugs, shaking his head.

“It’s Harry. She’s in hospital. I’ve got to take Rosie to Molly and then drive over to look after her. She fell down the stairs, apparently.”

I sigh, suppressing the urge to put my hand on his shoulder in comfort. He wouldn’t let me, I’m sure.

“Drunk?”

He snorts.

“You bet.”

I purse my lips and look at him, trying not to be disappointed that he’s leaving. It’s a family emergency. He _has_ to leave.

“I’m sorry, John.”

I really am. He deserves a break, but he doesn’t get one, ever.

He smiles briefly, but it never reaches his eyes.

“Thanks. It’s alright; this is nothing new. I just… God, I hope Molly isn’t busy. I can’t take Rosie with me.”

I clear my throat.

“You--- I mean, I could look after her as long as you’re away. If Molly is busy.”

He opens his mouth as if to speak, but then closes it again. He half-turns and looks into the living-room, where Rosie is sleeping in her travel cot, and then back at my face.

“Thank you,” he finally says. “But I’m sure Molly will be okay with it. She told me to call if something came up.”

I nod. My stomach is filled with ice.

“Of course.”

He swallows and frowns, suddenly looking pained and tired, but the expression vanishes as quickly as it came, and before I know it, he’s back to his usual indifferent self.

“Yeah…” he says and trails off.

I gesture for him to get going, acting for all it’s worth as if nothing was amiss.

“Go and take care of your sister.”

He turns without another word and I follow him to watch him gather his and Rosie’s things and then pick her up to carry her downstairs. I don’t ask if I can help. I’m sad that I can’t give Rosie a goodbye kiss – this is something I’m normally allowed to do, but I don’t want to wake her and make it harder on him. Sorting all of this out is probably difficult enough without a screaming baby in your arms.

Before he leaves, he turns around to look at me one last time.

“I’m not sure how long this will take,” he says.

I force the muscles of my face into a small smile, but it feels all sorts of wrong.

“Take your time. I’ll be here, working.”

He’s already halfway out the door.

I don’t wait to hear the lock click shut downstairs, but make my way back into the kitchen and pour myself a cup of tea. For a short, crazy moment I feel the desire to take the cup that was intended for him and smash it against the wall.

I close my eyes and imagine it in slow motion.

The shards would fly everywhere, and the plain, porous inside of the china would come to light, no longer shiny and beautiful in its blue-white décor. Just like our friendship, which we took and mended with half-spoken apologies to make it look whole and functional again. In reality, it could break at the slightest touch.

I’d take one of the shards, if there was a long and sharp one, and pull down my trousers, and press it into my thigh, and then there'd be blood and relief, at least for a little while.

I’m lucky he never looks at my legs. He only looks at the insides of my arms. I’m lucky Molly never told him what you get when you examine me in the back of an ambulance. She promised, after making _me_ promise to never do it again. And I haven’t.

Not yet, anyway.

Maybe he’s right in not wanting to entrust his child to my care. But I’m clean. I haven’t taken anything since my birthday (he must never know), and I never would with Rosie in the flat with me. I wouldn’t even talk to clients. I’d just sit with her and read stories to her and play my violin. She loves that – her eyes go big and curious when she listens to me, and her tiny hands make tiny fists that she puts in her mouth, and sometimes she babbles to herself while looking at me, and then it feels like a conversation.

I’d have tea, and she’d have milk, and in the evening I’d pick her up and carry her around for a bit, my cheek resting against her soft, downy hair, and her small body would grow heavy in my arms, and she’d fall asleep. I’d put her in her cot and watch over her.

I love her. I’d never hurt her.

Why doesn’t he know?

\---

I’m surprised when my phone rings half an hour later, the caller ID showing “John”. I pick up immediately.

“John.”

“Hey, Sherlock.”

I can’t place his tone, and my heart starts to pound.

“Is everything okay?”

The connection crackles and there are traffic noises in the background. He’s driving.

“Yes, yes… Sorry to disturb you. I just--- I’m on my way to Harry now. Molly’s looking after Rosie.”

Even though I love the people they are attached to, both names give me a pang. _Molly. Rosie._ Not Sherlock. He’s too dangerous. _Keep away from Sherlock._

“That’s good,” I say.

Why is he telling me that?

“Is there anything else?”

I’m proud of sounding cool, calm, collected.

“Listen, Sherlock… That sucked. That… situation. I’m sorry I didn’t handle it better.”

I can’t reply. What exactly is he talking about?

“I shouldn’t have treated you like that. You were only being nice. It’s just--- I need more time, okay? I’m not over seeing you like that, all high and crazy. But I know you’re trying, and I don’t want you to think that I don’t see that.”

“Oh-kay. Thank you?”

I sound like a bloody idiot, but he’s caught me off guard with this. He sighs.

“Okay. I just couldn’t leave that hanging in the air. Been thinking about it since I left the flat.”

“It’s alright, John. I know Rosie’s your first priority. Of course she is. And lately I haven’t given you much to show you it’s worth believing in me.”

He’s silent for a moment. Then he asks: “Will you be okay until I’m back, Sherlock?”

I press out a chuckle, even though I want to cry. He could have said _no, Sherlock, that’s not true_. _I_ do _believe in you._ But he didn’t.

“Of course. Give me a call when you get back. I’ll find us a nice, difficult case.”

He huffs out a short laugh.

“Okay. See you later, then.”

“Yes. See you later.”

He ends the call and I sit there, staring at the phone in my hand, not knowing how to feel. This was a step forward, right? I’m so scared to make a wrong move. I’m so terrible at dealing with people, with emotions, with myself.

I’m so scared.

\---

As always, we manage to simply not talk about it.

We just go on as per usual, taking new cases, solving them, blogging about them, and he’s being friendly, but the coolness in his eyes still hasn’t disappeared. I’m used to that, so it’s okay. He said he needs time. I’ll give him time.

All the time in the world, as long as he stays with me.

\---

It happens one afternoon, several weeks later, while we’re out at the Yard to talk to Anderson and Donovan, and so far the day has been completely ordinary, boring even.

I want samples of the victim’s clothes because I want to test them for traces of different poisons – mostly because I haven’t experimented in a while, at least not with poison, which has always been a special interest of mine. I think I already know how the woman died, but it’s always nice to have proof. So much more helpful at court, too. If it was Lestrade, I’d probably  - right, _maybe_ – just tell him what to look for, but Anderson and Donovan – no. No way in _hell_.

Anderson is blabbering right now, something about useless tests and the capability of the Yard’s forensic staff, but I tune him out. He’s just white noise to me. But then Donovan says something about equipment, about _syringes_ , and that reaches my brain, because John gets angry. I feel it before it’s visible, but Donovan doesn’t.

“Is _he_ even allowed to use--- ” she starts, her chin pointing at me condescendingly, but John’s reaction makes her stop in mid-sentence.

He balls his hands into fists and takes a step towards her, and I find myself flinching. A flashback of _knuckles hitting my face, feet kicking my ribs_ shoots through my mind, carrying a wave of phantom pain in its wake.

But no – he’s stepping in front of me, like a shield, like a wall that protects me from the bullets that are her venomous words. She holds her ground and doesn’t move backwards; I’ll give her that. But her eyes look apprehensive.

“Send the samples to Baker Street,” he says in a low, steely voice that sends a chill down my spine.

Then he turns and walks towards the exit, stopping in the doorway to wait for me to leave the room first. I do so, blood rushing in my ears. I can’t think.

When we’re outside, I just trail behind him, confused and a little lost amidst the bustle of the city. I almost get run over when the cab he’s hailed stops in front of us, but I take a step back just in time and he looks at me with a smirk and opens the door.

I get in after him, and he tells the driver to take us home--- to my flat, I mean. I lean back in my seat and try to breathe evenly. I don’t even realise that I’m staring at his profile until he startles me by suddenly turning his head.

“What an absolute _bitch_ ,” he says with gusto and grins at me.

Relief flows through me at the sight of his face, and the feeling is so intense that it threatens to overwhelm me. His blue irises are sparkling with the last remains of his anger at Donovan, but there’s something else there as well. Something I haven’t seen in a long, long time.

Loyalty. Trust. A sense of intimate understanding that belongs only to the two of us.

I nod, and his grin turns into a warm smile that spreads from the corners of his lips up to his eyes, the fine lines around them crinkling in a way I haven’t seen them do in ages.

“Make sure you make her look stupid when you figure out who killed the woman, Sherlock. Do it for me.”

I laugh, and briefly my body wonders how that works – it’s not really used to producing that particular sound anymore.

“You know that making them look stupid is what I aim for at all times. Solving the case is just a pleasant side effect,” I answer, my voice only slightly shaky.

He gives me an amused look and I ask myself how long this will last. It feels so good. I don’t know how I’d deal with it if he took it away from me again.

\---

When we arrive at Baker Street, I say I have to use the bathroom and ask him to make tea while we wait for the samples.

I lock the door and take my emergency stash out of the hidden compartment in my medicine cabinet. Looking at myself in the mirror, I squeeze the little bag of pills I’m holding in my hand. They mean delirium - if need be. They mean deliverance from my demons. If _this_ , this almost-forgotten look in his eyes, goes away again, they mean certain death.

I open the bag and pour its contents into the loo.

\---

_To be continued..._


	2. Friends

After the incident with Donovan, things really do get better. It feels almost like at the beginning of our acquaintance, when we knew that we would keep working together right after the very first case because it just felt _right_ , but we still had to get to know each other.

Maybe we have to get to know each other again, and maybe this is something like a fresh start? I just hope the people we’ve become will still fit together in the end.

John has started to fall back into his old habit of telling me that my deductions are _amazing_ , _incredible_ , and even though it doesn’t happen as often as it used to do, I soak up every word of praise, storing them all away in my John files to keep them safe for later use. I can look at all of it again if I need to feel good about myself and to help me remember that there’s hope that it will get better still.

I sometimes need this reassurance, because yes, there are _many_ good days... but there are bad days as well.

\---

A good day looks like this:

John comes over in the morning, sometimes with Rosie, and sometimes alone. We see clients or go out to investigate. We talk to Lestrade. Maybe we visit Molly at the morgue. We have lunch somewhere, and in the evening he sometimes stays for dinner (I always let him pick whatever he wants to order, because everything tastes better when he’s there) and we talk about the current case or Rosie’s first mornings at the nursery or even about our mutual friends and our families.

Sometimes he asks me about my childhood, about Mycroft and Eurus and my school days, and I tell him whatever he wants to know. I tell him about being this weird, quiet child, so intelligent, but so confused, and about the bullying that happened at school, because being able to read the dancing of bees and telling the teacher what she had for breakfast is not normal, not _right_ somehow, and the other boys let me know. And I tell him about Redbeard.

I still can’t fully comprehend that Victor is dead. He was just a little boy. He lives on in my mind palace – I had to build a whole new room to work through everything I’ve found out about the past and about what I had hidden from myself for such a long time. Sometimes I go to him and apologise, and he’s so tiny, standing there and looking up at me. I’m a man now. He never got the chance.

When I mentioned him for the first time, John hugged Rosie, who was sitting on his lap, close to his chest, his eyes filling with tears. He told me he was so, so sorry.

He was almost my friend again, then. 

We never talk about Mary, even though I sometimes wish we could, but I’m sure it would hurt John too much. He never even says her name, at least not when I am around. I could ask Molly if he sometimes talks to her, but that would feel like I’m going behind his back, so I don’t. I think it would do him good to talk once in a while.

Molly has forgiven me for what I made her do when Eurus forced me to play her sick little game – at least she says so. I know she’s probably not telling me everything, but who am I to expect her to open up to me? I hope she’ll meet someone, and soon. He’ll help her forget about me, and she’ll be better off. Even if there was no John to occupy my every thought, I couldn’t give her what she wants. I’m not what she thinks I am, and what she thinks she’s in love with. I’m useless. And Molly is a good friend, so it pains me to see her sad because of me.

\---

A bad day looks like this:

John either comes over and spreads his irritated, gloomy temper all over the flat (he never brings Rosie on those days) or calls me early to say he won’t make it.

If I stay on my own, I try to work as much as possible to keep myself from missing him. Sometimes clients are confused when I talk to an empty chair for a minute before realising that there won’t be an answer, because he’s not in it. But that’s no problem – my reputation lets me get away with virtually anything.

If he comes to work in one of his moods, I walk on eggshells and try not to rile him up any further.

I know I deserved it both times, but I couldn’t cope if he attacked me again. He’s already broken my nose and two of my ribs, but I know that a third time would break _me_. I know it’s wrong, because we're supposed to be partners and it’s gotten so much better in the last couple of months, but I’m still scared of this dark, irate version of him. When he’s angry, I see the tension coiling in his shoulders and in his jaw, and it makes me anxious to have to sit and wait for the bomb to drop – and drop it does, sooner or later, every time.

Many a surprised client, suspect, or random member of the Yard has already made the acquaintance of that part of his personality, and even though he hasn’t actually hit anyone again, he always leaves them shaken and intimidated. In all the time I’ve known him, he’s always been prone to losing it easily, but now, with Mary dead, it happens so much faster than before, and I often wonder whether he’s always had this furious creature inside of him or if it’s the war that made him the man he is today.

After a bad day, I don’t go to bed until the early hours of the morning. The more exhausted I am when I eventually fall asleep, the less likely I am to dream of John and myself at Culverton Smith’s morgue.

\---

We work through the days, weeks, months like that, and it seems that our old routine has finally returned.

The bad days become less and less frequent.

I’m still clean, and it’s getting easier and easier to ignore that my body still wants the fix.

John stops checking the flat for drugs and my arms for marks.

Life is almost back to normal.

I wish I knew what it’s like for him; I wish I knew how he sees me now. But I can’t ask him that. I’ll just have to wait.

\---

It’s a sunny Friday in autumn that turns my world around.

Twice.

He comes to work whistling, taking two stairs at a time and, judging by the smell that’s wafting through the open door to announce his arrival, carrying coffee for both of us, and I’m so amazed by this that I just stand rooted to the spot and stare at him when he enters the flat.

He stops on the doorstep and frowns, but his mouth is smiling.

“Morning!” he says. “Are you… alright?”

I shake myself out of my stupor and nod.

“Yes. Of course. Good morning, John.”

He comes in and hands me one of the paper cups he’s holding.

“I brought coffee.”

 _Obviously_ , I think, and because he’s in such a happy mood, I’m brave and say it out loud.

“Obviously.”

He laughs and makes his way to his chair to sit down.

“What have we got today? I should tell you – I’m nipping out for a few hours in the afternoon, maybe two, if that’s okay with you.”

I join him, sipping my coffee and enjoying its strong, almost chocolatey taste on my tongue.

“Sure,” I answer. “I’ll have to meet up with Lestrade, but you don’t have to be there if you’re busy.”

He nods, licking his lips.

“Good. Thanks.”

“I hope it’s a pleasant appointment?”

I ask before it occurs to me that the question might be too private for this stage of our relationship, but he just grins.

“I hope so, too. I’ve only just met her.”

Oh.

I feel my face freeze into an expression of polite surprise and know I should look more pleased, but my heart stutters at his words and my stomach churns in a sudden fit of nausea.

“Oh,” I say, because there’s nothing else in my head right now.

_Oh._

\---

I can’t really concentrate on the case anymore, but I go to the Yard anyway, just to have something to do.

Lestrade doesn’t notice, because I’m a great multitasker, but all through our conversation I imagine John having a drink (another coffee perhaps, or a very early pint?) with a faceless woman, sitting in a café or in a pub, talking, flirting, their hands resting on the small table, their fingers touching all by accident, _oh_ , and then they’re laughing, and looking into each other’s eyes, and then their lips are touching, too.

I'm jealous, I'm _lovesick_ , and I hate myself for it.

I knew this would happen, but I didn’t think it would be so soon.

My strategy for coping with it is to stop by at Billy’s on my way back to Baker Street to ask him to sell me a few of his good ones, and he wants to refuse, but after all he’s just an addict, too, and my will is strong. In the end, he gives me what I want.

The feeling of the little plastic bag in my pocket is already enough to calm me down. If it gets too bad, I can escape for a while. That doesn’t mean I’ll do it. The knowledge that I _could_ is enough for now.

\---

He comes back around seven, his face unreadable. He smells faintly of alcohol. I’ve already told myself not to be disappointed if he doesn’t come back at all, so I’m relieved when he does. So relieved, in fact, that I decide to try and be a good _partner? friend?_ and ask: “Did you have a good time?”

He snorts.

“Yeah. At _first_. Turns out that being a single father is not sexy. Everything went perfectly fine until I mentioned Rosie. She tried to get away so fast, Sherlock. _Fuck._ ”

He laughs bitterly and looks at his hands, and out of their own accord my eyes follow his gaze. He’s not wearing his wedding ring anymore.

_Oh…_

He raises his head and looks at me, his jaw set.

“What about dinner at Angelo’s?” he asks.

\---

“You know, I never meant for it to be serious. I was just… testing the waters.”

We went and picked Rosie up from Molly’s, and now we’re sitting at our usual table, Rosie positioned between us in an abominably ugly pink high chair Angelo has produced from his back room, steaming plates of pasta and a bottle of red wine in front of us. And the mandatory candle, but John hasn’t mentioned it so far.

He’s talking. He’s eating and talking and opening up, and I’m eating and listening, now and then handing Rosie a noodle to chew on. There’s nothing else I want in the world right now.

“No one could replace her, Sherlock. Don’t think I’m trying to replace her.”

He looks at me, a desperate, urgent expression in his eyes, and I nod to show I understand. It hurts me, but I do, in a way.

“I didn’t think you were. It’s none of my business anyway, but I know you’d never just move on like that. I know it’ll take time.”

He swallows. His gaze flickers to Rosie and then back to my face, and then he whispers: “I needed some… I don’t know, somebody to--- Oh, _sod_ it. I wanted to go home with her and have sex, nothing more.”

The food doesn’t taste as great anymore, but I continue putting it in my mouth anyway. What am I supposed to say to that?

He shakes his head, looking disgusted with himself.

“I’m a _great_ father. I’m glad Rosie doesn’t understand what I tried to do today. Filling the gap her mother left by pulling a random woman I’ve just met on the street. I should be ashamed.”

He must have had quite a few drinks already. We _never_ talk about these things. But it’s what friends do, right? Maybe it means I’ve progressed to the next level now?

I play with my napkin, feeling awkward. I have no idea how to deal with this, but he's feeling bad, and I want to help him feel better, even if thinking about him having sex with _anyone_ tears me apart inside.

“I’m not an expert on the topic, but I gather that it’s normal to feel these… urges, John. You shouldn’t feel guilty. You--- It doesn’t mean you don’t honour her memory.”

He sighs.

“Thanks. I know. It’s just that I’ve always used sex as a means to let off steam, which isn’t a great way to deal with your problems anyway, and, even more importantly, right now it’s not only _me_ anymore who then has to suffer the consequences. I have to start thinking of my daughter, too.”

He fixes his gaze on me then, his eyes boring into mine, and I feel a shiver run down my back.

“I’ve never really seen you with a woman, Sherlock,” he says. “Don’t you ever miss it?”

My pulse accelerates. I know I’m at a crossroads now – I can either lie and thus steer the conversation away from the topic that humiliates me so, or I tell him the truth. Not the whole truth, I couldn’t do that, but a part of it.

I put down my fork, bracing myself. I've made up my mind.

“I’ve already told you that girlfriends are not really my area. We were sitting at this very table then, remember?”

I try to keep my tone light, conversational. He nods and takes a sip of his wine.

“Right. Okay. So… what about boyfriends then?”

I hesitate, but then decide to just say it. I want him to be my friend. Friends tell each other things.

“You can’t really miss what you’ve never had.”

He doesn’t move. Doesn’t even _blink_. I can tell he’s trying to put the pieces together in his head, but he’s not quite there yet. I’ll help him out.

“I don’t have relationships, John. I’m not made for it. And one-night stands are out of the question. I can’t open up to someone like that. So… I don’t really know if I ever miss it, because I don’t know what it’s like.”

This is the part where I leave out bits of the truth, because of course I know the theory of it all, and I’ve used that knowledge to offer myself release whenever the impulse became too strong. It’s not like the real thing, of that I am sure, because I understand that if it’s the right person, the real thing doesn’t leave one feeling even more empty than before. But it’s still sex. He mustn’t know what I do to him in my mind – he’d be repulsed.

His hand comes up to rub his neck in a nervous gesture. I hope I haven’t made him too uncomfortable.

“I--- I don’t know what to say, Sherlock… This comes as a bit of a surprise.”

Now _I’m_ surprised, too. He knows what I’m like, so how can he think it could be any different?

“Why are you surprised? Isn't it obvious?” I ask.

He laughs, and it sounds slightly incredulous.

“Are you serious? Have you looked at yourself? Do you notice what happens when you enter a room?”

I shrug.

“Yes. People get irritated and tell me to fuck off.”

“Sherlock…” he starts, and then cringes. “Fuck, I’m a bit drunk, so I’ll just tell you, alright? You’re very--- _very_ attractive, Sherlock, and people want to get into your pants all the time. I can’t believe you don’t notice that, what with you being a _genius_ and all. I mean, do you remember Irene Adler? She'd have thrown herself right at you if you'd given her the opportunity. It just never occurred to me that a man like you could be a v--- could never have wanted to--- make use of his sex appeal.”

I gape at him.

No. I’m not like that. People don’t do that. He’s crazy, and drunk, and why does it feel so _incredibly_ good to have him telling me I’m attractive, even though I know I’m not?

“People hate me as soon as I open my mouth, John.”

_It’s always been like that._

He raises his eyebrows as if to say _oh, really?_

“I always thought you did that on purpose," he jokes, and in spite of myself I have to grin. "They don't know who you really are, Sherlock," he continues, more serious now. "Besides, you don’t have to like someone to want them. I get what you mean when you say you don’t want to open up for just a bit of fun, but it amazes me that you think people wouldn’t want you to.” He pauses, and then grins as well. “What about Janine then? I thought the two of you… you know. Did the deed?”

I clear my throat, happy that we’re moving into easier territory, but my heart still stumbling over his words from a moment ago. _They don't know who you really are, Sherlock._

“No," I answer. "Not for lack of trying on her part, though. What she put in the papers was just her revenge for the way I treated her. Well. It was probably justified.”

He laughs then, and it’s a _real_ laugh, and it makes me feel so good. He doesn’t think I’m abnormal, this laugh says, he doesn’t think I’m ridiculous, or to be pitied. I’m just this weird bloke who’s never had sex, and it’s okay.

“This is strange, isn’t it?” he asks, gesturing back and forth in the space between us. “Us, here, talking about this?”

I bite my lip. The humour is not lost on me – here we are, the supposedly asexual freak and the promiscuous womaniser-turned husband-turned widower, discussing non-existent sex lives that are non-existent for such different reasons. It's hilarious, and sad.

I don’t know what to reply, but Angelo saves me by suddenly showing up to ask if the food is alright, which we answer in the affirmative. He gives us a little bow and then reaches down and tickles Rosie’s chin, and she giggles and tries to grab his nose.

“She is _beautiful_ , your sweet little bambina!” he exclaims in his usual exuberant way. “She has your eyes, so big and blue and pretty!”

He looks at John, who smiles a bit sheepishly, but I can see that he’s a proud father.

Angelo huffs out a deep belly laugh.

“Yes, yes, but let’s all agree that we hope she’s got _your_ brains, right?” He points at me.  “Another _brilliant_ one to help keep this city clean, eh?”

_Oh God._

This is _I'll get a candle for the table. It's more romantic._ multiplied by a thousand, and I glance at John, afraid of his reaction. To my immense astonishment he’s still smiling.

“I’ll try not to be offended by that,” he says. “I know I'm not a genius, but at least I’m  _pretty_ , right?”

Angelo laughs again and then walks away humming to himself, and I wince and look at my plate.

“Sorry,” I murmur.

I’m certain he’ll drop the act as soon as Angelo’s out of earshot, but when the seconds tick by and he doesn’t start ranting, I look up again.

He’s not smiling anymore, but he’s not mad, either. There’s a strange look in his eyes that I can’t read, and I watch him clean some squashed noodles off Rosie’s hands and cheeks.

“You’re raising her just as much as I am,” he suddenly says, his voice low and a bit shaky.

I take a deep breath, feeling the room start to spin around me. The sudden change of subject has me speechless. I tell myself to keep it together, but I’ve never been good at having these conversations, and now I’m here, having just talked about being a virgin for the very first time in my life, and I haven’t even gotten over _that_ yet, and now _this_ , and if it’s _him_ talking to me, everything becomes ten times more complicated anyway. Is he telling me I’m a part of his private life as well now? Is this the moment I’ve been waiting for, him letting me know we’re friends again?

His eyes meet mine across the table.

“You don’t have to say anything,” he adds, obviously reading my mind. “I just wanted to… I guess I should have told you earlier. Thank you for being there for both of us, Sherlock.”

I reach for my glass. If I want to survive this evening, I’ll definitely need more wine.

\---

We continue our meal in a less emotionally charged atmosphere, and I’m thankful for that. He seems to realise that it’s all getting a bit much for me and starts to talk about the case we’re working on instead, asking me about my meeting with Lestrade.

I’m just getting into a longish explanation of the theory I have as to where the blood stains on the victim’s window could originate from when he suddenly puts his hand on my arm and cuts me off mid-sentence.

“Sherlock. That bloke over there just took a picture of us.”

Before I can react and find out who he’s talking about, he’s already gotten up from his chair.

“It’s a fucking reporter. Watch Rosie for me.”

“John---“

But it’s too late.

He’s already on his way to confront the man, and I’m glad it’s such a quiet evening – apart from ours, there are only two more tables that are occupied. An elderly couple is sitting at the back of the room, quite a distance away, and then there’s the reporter. I can see John is right – it’s not only that he’s taking pictures of us with his phone, but there are also a small notepad and a pen on the table in front of him. He’s sitting much closer to us, so I’m not sure how much of our conversation he was able to overhear.

I scold myself for not being on my guard well enough tonight - after everything the press did to me in the last couple of years, I'm usually much more careful.

“Hey! What do you think you're doing?”

Rosie hears her father raise his voice and frowns at me, her lower lip quivering, and I take her out of her chair and wrap her in my arms so that she’s facing away from the room.

“It’s alright, honeybee… I’m here… everything’s okay,” I mutter, trying to keep my tone calm and soft.

Even as I comfort her, my eyes are set on John, who’s by now grabbed the notepad and flicked through it, and when he looks up and at its owner again, his mouth is a hard, thin line.

“Really?” he asks, his voice a low growl.

The man doesn’t answer, but raises his chin in a defiant way.

John rips a few pages out of the notepad, puts them in his pocket, and drops it back on the table. He then holds out his hand.

“Give me the phone.”

“Why would I do that?”

The man’s voice is raspy and unpleasant, and his eyes are small, dark and mean. I’ve never seen him before, and by now we’ve had to give so many statements and were present at so many press conferences that I’m quite certain I’ve memorised the faces of all the usual suspects. I assume this one’s a freelancer, selling his stories to anyone who’ll pay for them, and if he heard everything we said, he’ll probably find quite a few interested parties.

“Because that would mean that we do this the easy way. We can also opt for the hard way, if you’d rather do that. Either way, I’ll get the phone. If you’re nice, I’ll take out the memory card and you can have it back. If you’re not, I’ll just break the fucking thing and take what I want. So. How’s it going to be?”

John sounds so dangerously calm that I’m surprised to see that the other man makes no move to comply. Quite the opposite - he pulls himself up in his chair and smirks arrogantly.

“You can fuck off, mate. This is a free country, and there’s freedom of the press. If I hear something that the public is interested in, I can write about it.”

John smiles.

I know what that means and hold Rosie a bit tighter, humming her favourite tune to distract her from the noises that I suspect are going to start in a moment.

He’s not a soldier anymore, hasn’t been one for years, but now I get a demonstration of how deeply his training is still ingrained in him. It happens so fast that I can hardly see what exactly he’s doing, but the reporter ends up in a half-sitting, half-standing position and with his arm twisted back in what looks like a _very_ uncomfortable angle – and John gets the phone.

“I’m not your _mate_ ,” he hisses through clenched teeth and pulls at the wrist he’s holding until the man whimpers in pain. "If you publish any of that, I'll find you. I won't be as gentle then. And make no mistake - I _will_ find you. And if I can't, my friends at MI6 will."

I know he’s longing to do more, to _hurt_ the man more, I can see it in his face, but I hope he’ll keep himself in check. He could end up in custody one day if he doesn’t stop.

That’s what my brain says, and of course it’s right. I’m surprised to find that my heart and my body feel differently about the matter.

When John drops the phone and uses the heel of his shoe to break it, a jolt of pride and, yes, _lust_ ripples through me. He’s doing this for me, for _us_ , and I’m shocked by how weak his protective behaviour makes me feel. I’m not a damsel in distress – I know how to fight myself, and I’m just as strong as he is, so why do I feel like going home with him now to let him use his pent-up energy on me in an entirely different way?

Why am I not scared of him anymore? Why is my flesh not remembering his fists colliding with my face?

Why is his violence turning me on?

“Thanks,” John says coldly and pushes the man to the floor, where he stays for a moment to collect himself and nurse his arm, thus giving John the time to pick up what’s left of the phone and separate the memory card from the rest of its parts. 

Angelo steps onto the scene then and bends down to help the man up.

“It’s time for you to go now,” he says quietly. “Your wine’s on the house.”

The reporter glares at me, then at John. “I’ll sue you!” he yells.

John just shrugs and joins me at our table again.

“You’re my witness!” The man turns towards Angelo, who doesn’t loosen his hold on his arm, but picks up his belongings from the table and pushes them into his hands.

“I didn’t see anything. I have no idea what you’re talking about… _mate_.”

Angelo doesn’t look like the friendly Italian chef anymore, and maybe the reporter has noticed that, too. Perhaps that’s the reason why he really does leave then, but not without sending me a furious look over his shoulder. Maybe this isn’t over yet, I think.

But at least it’s over for now.

The elderly couple is staring at me from across the room, and I try to smile. I’m innocent. Look, I’ve got a baby here! They look away again.

Angelo claps his hands together. “More wine for _everybody_ , eh? On the house!”

\---

When we get home, John puts Rosie in her cot, where she falls asleep immediately. He then flops down on the couch and groans.

“Do you mind if I crash here tonight?” he asks. “I’ve had too much to drink, and I don’t feel like taking a cab home. I’d have to leave the car here and take the tube tomorrow to get it…”

_Oh God, yes, please. Stay. Stay…_

I’ve had too much to drink as well. I feel lightheaded and so happy that he’s here, but I don’t want to show it. I don't want him to feel overwhelmed.

“Sure,” I answer and sit down next to him. “Would you like to sleep in your old bedroom?”

He looks up, surprised.

“I didn’t know you still rented that.”

I might have given away too much there, and my mood changes from exhilarated to embarrassed within the fraction of a second. I shrug, swallowing around the lump of unsaid words in my throat. What can I say? _I miss you? I wish you came back? You’ll_ always _have a room here?_

He notices it. Of course he does – he knows me so well. He smiles sadly, and his pity wounds me more than anything else.

“I don’t know, Sherlock,” he says softly. “Maybe I’d rather sleep on the couch. I--- It would be too much like... like when I still lived here.”

Oh. _Oh_ , that hurts. It hurts _so_ much.

I fidget with the cuffs of my shirt, trying hard not to break down, or to say something even more stupid, or to run to my bedroom and hide.

He inhales loudly. His ocean eyes look dark and beautiful in the twilight.

“I miss it, Sherlock. It pains me to go home in the evenings. Living here was… It was the best time of my life. I don’t know if I could bear it to return to my old room and then leave again tomorrow.”

...

_What?_

He touches my shoulder, only briefly, but the small contact burns like fire on my skin, even through the fabric of my clothes.

"I'm really drunk. I'm sorry, Sherlock. I'm talking too much."

He smiles shyly, and it makes me want to kiss him.

I don't. But it's difficult not to give in to the yearning that's eating my heart. So difficult.

"What did it say on the notepad?" I ask.

If I don't talk about something else _quickly_ , I'll do something that I'll regret later.

He turns away and shakes his head.

"Never mind."

It's bad, then.

"I want to know, John. Tell me."

He presses his lips together as if he wanted to refuse me the answer, but then speaks again, his tone resigned.

"He heard almost everything. And you can imagine what kind of headline a picture of us having a candlelight dinner would go with."

I thought so.

"I'm sorry," I say. 

He looks at me again and furrows his brow.

"What? Why? It's not your fault. He's an arsehole."

"Yes, but... I know it makes you uncomfortable to be associated with---" I start, trying to explain, but he interrupts me by raising his hand and shaking his head.

"Wait, wait, _Sherlock_. Do you think I attacked him because I'm afraid of being called gay by a fucking tabloid reporter?"

I'm dumbfounded by this straightforward question, and I'm sure I look it right now.

"I... yes?"

He huffs.

"Fuck, Sherlock, _no_. He was going to hurt you, to embarrass you in front of _everyone_. I couldn't allow that."

He leans his head against the backrest of the couch, his lids fluttering shut. I look at his profile, searching the familiar features for traces of John _I'm-not-his-date_ Watson, but all I see is this _new_ John. A new man is sitting next to me, and I don't know him, and it confuses the hell out of me.

"You know what, _fuck_ it," he mutters. "He can write whatever he wants about me. But if he exposes you, your most private secrets, to the public, I'll find him and teach him a lesson he won't ever forget."

His voice is rough and deep and his speech has turned slightly slurry. He's tired. I mirror him by leaning back as well. Our shoulders are almost touching now. Although I have no idea what's going on, I feel a strange kind of warm inside.

"I'm sure Mycroft will be delighted to hear that he's got a _friend_ now," I tell the ceiling, and he giggles, sounding just as drunk as he obviously is.

I shut my eyes and breathe in his smell. He's so close.

"G'night Sherlock," he murmurs and clumsily pats my leg.

Then he falls asleep.

\---

I stay awake for a long time and listen to his quiet snores. The heat radiating from his sleeping form is seeping into my side, and I revel in the intimacy of sharing these moments with him, even though he's not really present to witness it.

It's two in the morning when I finally get up and spread a blanket over him to keep him warm and then go to bed myself.

He's here. He says he misses it. Misses _me?_ I miss him, too. So much.

Sleep takes me, suddenly and without me noticing it, and I dream of his smiling face and of his hand on my thigh. We're at Angelo's, only the two of us, and there's a candle on our table. "You're very attractive," he whispers into my ear, and then we kiss.

I never want to wake up again.

\---

I do wake up eventually, not feeling well-rested, the bittersweet memory of my dream that's still echoing faintly in the back of my mind competing with a mild headache, and because I know that this mixture will make falling asleep again impossible, I get up to see if he's awake yet. 

He isn't.

Sometime in the night he must have shifted to lie down on the couch completely, and he's now huddled up underneath the blanket, breathing deeply.

He looks young and pure like this, his forehead smooth and free of his usual frown of grief or annoyance. I want to brush the tousled strands of silver-blond hair that have fallen across his closed lids aside. I want to caress his cheek, feel the light stubble rasp against my fingertips.

Of course I don't.

After checking on Rosie as well (still fast asleep, too) I go to the bathroom.

I need a shower. And an aspirin. I'll have to talk to Angelo about his choice of house wine.

\---

I'm just about to towel off when there's an urgent knock at the door.

"Sherlock?" comes his muffled voice. "Are you going to be long? I need to pee!"

This reminds me so much of the old days. We'd always share the bathroom in quite a literal sense, neither of us shy about peeing or shaving while the other one was showering - or the other way around. I know those days are gone, but I'll bask in every remnant of them that I can get.

"Come in!" I call and wrap my towel around my hips. "I'm almost finished!"

My head's still a bit cloudy, but I'm feeling much better already.

The door opens and he shuffles into the room, dressed in yesterday's clothes and looking dishevelled and a bit hungover.

"Hey," he says hoarsely and sends me a lopsided smile. "Thanks for letting me---"

He stops abruptly, his eyes stuck at something below my groin, and _oh_. Oh God. Oh _no._

I forgot about my scars.

"Sherlock, fuck. _Fuck!_ What's that?" he whispers in a hollow voice.

I'm frozen in place. How could I have forgotten that my body is for no one to see - _especially_ not him?

He steps closer to take another look, and I can only stand there and let it happen. I feel more naked than ever.

"Sherlock---" 

He touches my shoulder and pushes a little so that I have to turn away from him, and I know he's seen it. He's seen the other ones as well. My whole body turns cold.

" _Fuck_ ," he repeats.

I stare at the wall, grateful that I don't have to look at him right now. I couldn't bear seeing his face contorted in shock and disappointment. I'm even more broken than he thought.

He's doesn't say anything more. I listen to his laboured breathing and ask myself if it's anger or repulsion that makes him sound like that.

All of a sudden he lets go of me and I hear him retch. I turn my head and find him bending over the loo, throwing up violently.

I've never felt worse in my whole life.

Look how you disgust him. You're making him _sick_.

I want to die.

In the living-room, Rosie begins to scream.

_Stop. I can't._

I sit down on the edge of the bath, close my eyes, and escape.

\---

Victor looks up from his pirate book when I enter his room. His gaze tells me that he knows I'm not well. I sit down on the floor and fold my legs against my chest, making myself small, and he rises from his chair and walks up to me to hug me from behind, his thin little arms wrapping around my neck, his heart beating against my back.

I hang my head and start to cry.

\---

_To be continued..._


	3. More

“He’s coming for you, Sherlock,” Victor whispers into my hair, ruffling the curls at the back of my head with his warm breath. “John Watson is coming.”

I look up from where I’ve been resting my forehead on my knees and see that I’ve stained the legs of my trousers with tears and snot. Victor squeezes my shoulders, then vanishes.

The door opens, and there is John. He moves his mouth around my name, but no sound comes out.

_Sherlock?_

He hurries over and bends down to where I’m cowering on the floor.

_Sherlock._

His eyes look so gentle, but I know it’s not real.

“Sherlock?”

He grabs my arm and shakes me a little, and this time I can hear his voice, but it’s as if he’s calling me from far, far away.

“Sherlock! Can you hear me?”

He’s getting louder, his grip firmer.

“Sherlock. Wake up. Come on now.”

I don’t want to. I want to stay here, with Victor, and with John’s gentle eyes.

“ _Sherlock!_  Wake UP!”

\---

I come to with a gasp and find myself still in the bathroom, still sitting there in my towel, John standing in front of me with a worried look on his face.

“Christ!” he exclaims when I raise my head to look into his eyes. “There you are.”

He’s holding on to my shoulders, his fingers digging into my flesh, and I realise that he thinks he has to hold me up.

“I won’t fall over; you can let go,” I tell him, giving my voice an indifferent air to hide what’s going on inside of me.

His breath smells of toothpaste, but it can't cover the faint traces of vomit entirely, and being the reason for his disgust sits as a real, solid pain in the middle of my chest. He laughs, but it’s not the carefree, drunken laugh from last night. This time it sounds hysterical, shocked, and impatient.

“Don’t you  _dare_  and do your fucking Sherlock Holmes thing now. Do you hear me? I want to know what happened.  _Right now._ ”

He lets go of me with one hand and flicks the towel aside to expose my right thigh and the criss-crossing white and pink scars littering it, not noticing or caring that other parts of me almost get uncovered in the process, too. This is a scenario that has often occurred in my fantasies, but of course the circumstances were different then, and my body looked different, too.

This is the worst thing that could have happened,  _ever_ , but especially now that we’ve grown closer again, and everything I’ve been building up with him up to now will be destroyed when it’s over.

“Where’s Rosie?” I ask, suddenly remembering that she was crying when I left.

He doesn’t take his eyes off me.

“She’s with Mrs Hudson. She’ll stay there for however long it takes.”

So he rinsed his mouth, peed (?), and went downstairs and got himself a babysitter. I must have been with Victor for longer than I thought.

“I’m cold,” I say, and it’s not stalling – I really am. My skin is still damp from the shower, and my hair is barely towel-dry. I’m covered in goose bumps and shivering in the slight draught caused by the open bathroom door.

He sighs, straightens up, and takes my dressing gown from the hook on the wall. I immediately mourn the loss of his touch.

“Here,” he says and hands me the garment. “Get dry and put this on. I’ll be waiting.”

\---

When I enter the living-room, I’m grateful to find him sitting in his chair instead of on the couch. I need some space between us if I want to make it through the conversation he wants to have.

He’s made tea. If all of this wasn’t so terrible, I’d laugh. Tea! This has always been his way of reacting to uncomfortable situations, and I’ve always found it so endearing. But it's probably the last cup he’ll ever make for me.

“Are you feeling better?” I ask him as I sit down, because I don’t know what else to say. He’ll have to ask questions if he wants me to talk.

He exhales through his nose, loudly.

“No.”

_Okay._

I pick up the cup he’s put on the side table for me and take a sip, looking at his face. He’ll have to  _ask_. I don’t know where to start.

“I want you to tell me where you got those scars from, Sherlock. And I want the truth, and all of it. Please. I need to know.”

His voice is shaking, and his hands are, too. He’s paler than I’ve ever seen him.

I look into my cup and watch tiny bits of tea leaves float around in the milky-brown liquid.

And then I talk.

\---

I tell him about jumping off St. Bart’s after talking to him on the phone, about how I’d never planned for him to witness it. I tell him that I could hear him while I was lying on the ground with fake blood on my face, that I could see him out of unblinking eyes when he bent over me to take my pulse, and that it broke my heart not to be able to let him know that it’s all just for show.  _He's my friend; let me through..._  - it still haunts me, and I tell him that as well. No punishment he could have given me when I returned could have been worse than hearing his voice say that sentence, over and over again, for two years.

“But  _why_  didn’t you tell me about the plan?!”

“Because I needed to protect you! He would have  _known_. Don’t you understand? He would have  _killed_  you!”

“Molly knew!”

“I needed Molly to help me. She was the key – without her, it wouldn’t have been possible. And no one ever notices Molly.”

“You’re cruel.”

“I know. But I knew that no one would ever suspect.”

I tell him about not finding the right way to contact him afterwards, about what I had to do to take down Moriarty’s men one by one, and about how weeks turned into months turned into years as I continued to find and destroy more and more of them.

"I couldn't come back before they were all gone, John. I didn't know if Moriarty had plans that went beyond his own death."

"I missed you so much. I went insane with grief over you."

"I'm sorry. If there had been a way to let you know, I would have done so. Believe me, please."

"I wanted to kill myself for a while, Sherlock."

...

"John---"

"It's alright. My therapist helped me. Mary helped me, too."

"I'm glad she did, John. So glad. I could never have forgiven myself if---"

"No. Me neither. Tell me what happened next." 

I tell him about Serbia, and he goes even paler than he was before. There are beads of sweat on his forehead, and he looks like he’s going to be sick again, or maybe faint. 

“I--- Oh  _God_ , Sherlock, I’m  _so_  sorry… I’m--- Oh God...”

“Do you need me to stop?”

“No, I--- I’m sorry. No, please, continue.”

I tell him about Mycroft saving me, and about coming back to find him, John, with Mary, a new life without me in it spreading out in front of him. I tell him how it hurt me to see I had lost the most important person in my life, and that I know it was my fault, and my fault only.

I don’t tell him that by then I’d been in love with him for years.

I tell him about turning to the drugs to help me work, help me  _cope_ , and about hurting myself when even that wasn’t enough.

That’s when he gets up from his chair with a sudden motion, and I jerk back and hold up my hands in an unconscious gesture of defence. There it is - my body _is_ remembering him after all. He stares at me as I will myself to relax again, and time stops for a moment. His chest is heaving.

“ _Sherlock_ ,” he sighs and takes a step towards me.

Then he sinks to his knees in front of me, hides his face in his hands, and begins to sob.

I freeze. I don’t know what to do. This is not like him crying on my birthday. That time he was quiet, and he tried to hold back his pain even as I held him in my arms, his whole body vibrating with the effort it took him not to break down. Now it’s loud, and raw, and excruciating in its  _realness_ , and I’m scared to touch him, to talk to him, even. What if I do it wrong?

He looks up at me then, his eyes wet and puffy, his fingers clasped in front of his mouth, and I feel tears tugging at the back of my throat too. He looks so lost, so small, so  _desperate_ , and I’m the reason for it all.

“I’m sorry!” he chokes out. “Oh  _God_ , I’m so  _sorry_ , Sherlock! Oh God, what have I done? What have I  _done?_ ”

I don’t understand what he’s talking about. Why is he apologising to me?  _I’m_  the one to blame for all of this!

“John---“ I start, but he interrupts me by gripping my knees and squeezing them in his hands.

“Don’t you  _see?_ ” he hisses, sounding not like himself at all. “All this time I’ve been thinking about how you mistreated me,  _hurt_  me by leaving me so out of the blue, by becoming an addict again, by being this irritating, infuriating  _mind machine_  that no one really understands, and I wallowed in self-pity and told you I needed  _time_  – I never even  _thought_  about what those two years did to  _you_ , what made you use again after you’d been clean for a while, what me excluding you from my life meant for you, your wellbeing---”

He gulps for air; he’s talking so fast. His eyes are large, insanely so, so much that I can see the white around his irises, and it makes him look slightly deranged.

“You had these scars on your back when you returned to me, Sherlock, and they were  _fresh_ , a reminder of what you sacrificed to protect me, Mrs Hudson, Lestrade… and all I did was hit you,  _hurt_  you, give you  _new_ pain on top of the old, and you never said  _anything_ , you just  _took_  it… I’m a monster… I’m a  _monster!_ ”

He’s sobbing, completely out of control now, but he continues speaking, his words like pus seeping out of an infected wound.

“Look at you now! You're feeling pity for me, even  _now_ , even after everything I did to you! You look sad, and still so  _guilty_ , Sherlock! Stop it!  _I'm_  the guilty one! I did it  _again_ , at the morgue, because I wanted you to feel pain like I did, because I--- I  _knew_  you thought you were responsible for Mary’s death, and I wanted to tell you so, to make you  _suffer_ … I  _hated_  you so much for being still there while she wasn’t… And you were high all the time, so  _selfish_ , I thought,  _typical_ , it’s Sherlock fucking Holmes, and he only cares about himself… And all the while--- you’d been sitting at home,  _cutting_  yourself because you didn’t know how to deal with it all! I'm--- so ashamed! How can you bear looking at me,  _being_  with me?  _How?!_ ”

He’s hoarse from crying, and listening to him hurts a little, but still he doesn’t stop.

“And now, now you’re  _scared_  of me, flinching when you see me make an unexpected move, and there’s  _nothing_  I can do to take this back, Sherlock... I can’t make it  _better_  again! How---  _How_  could I treat you like that? How could I hurt a person I love so much--- and not even  _see_  it? You are not like me, Sherlock, no... You would have  _died_  instead of betraying me when Eurus asked you to choose… I don’t  _deserve_  you--- I won’t forgive myself for how I hurt you,  _never_  in all my life… and I’ll understand if you can’t forgive me, either.”

He’s slowing down now, his sobs turning into hiccups, and he leans his forehead against my left knee and closes his eyes, breathing erratically. My head is spinning; I'm trying to comprehend what he’s saying there, but failing to get a grasp.

_I'm so ashamed!_

_I hurt a person I love so much._

_I don’t deserve you…_

Fragments of his monologue keep bouncing back and forth in my mind, but I can’t get a hold of them to give me a clear image of what he means to communicate.

I always thought he was right in hating me. I swore to protect Mary, and I didn’t. I lied to him about my addiction. I tricked him into forgiving me for keeping him in the dark about my plans. Why on earth would he still want to be my friend?

Why on earth would he still  _love_  me?

“I knew it as soon as I saw your back…" he suddenly says, his tone hollow and filled with self-loathing. "I knew how old the scars had to be, and I knew that they’d been fresh wounds around the time you came back… I imagined the stitches opening up again when I pushed you to the floor… I  _disgust_  myself.”

So that’s why he had to throw up? Does that mean he isn’t revolted by what I look like now? I stare at the back of his head, and because I can’t speak, can’t ask him anything or comfort him yet, I put my hand there to run my fingers through his tousled hair.

He shivers.

“Forgive me, please,  _please_ …” he whispers. “Sherlock, I'm  _so_  sorry…  _please_.”

It pains me so much to see him like this, but I can't answer. My mind can't handle everything that's happened since last night, and I'm scared I'll do something unwise if I start talking now - things he mustn't know might come to the surface, and then what?

_I've bought pills again._

_I still think about cutting myself whenever we have a bad day._

_I love you._

His right hand slides from my knee down to my shin and his arm finally wraps itself around my legs - whether it's to ground himself or to keep me from going away I cannot tell. 

"Last night I realised I'm being an arsehole for always making you feel that I'm ashamed to be considered more than--- just your friend... and I thought this was the only way I failed you. Can you believe that?" he mumbles. "You are not the one to blame for how things went wrong, Sherlock. I see now that you really think everything's your fault, but it isn't. You chose the wrong path and hurt yourself in the process, yes... but I chose the wrong path and hurt  _you_ , which is so much worse. Please stop thinking you're to blame, because you aren't." His voice breaks. "You  _aren't_."

I'm glad I don't have to look at his face now, because his words are causing such turmoil inside of me that I can't help but finally surrender to the tears pressing against the insides of my lids. I close my eyes and let them come, and they run down my cheeks, leaving hot trails of salt on my skin. My breath hitches and I suppose he can guess what's going on, but he doesn't look up or say anything else.

We just stay there, him on the floor with his arm slung around my calves, me with my fingertips pressing against his scalp, and cry.

\---

I’m not sure how long it lasts – it could be ten minutes, but it might as well be half an hour. My sense of time has been out of kilter ever since I got up, and now I feel as if this day has been going on forever, although it can't be much later than ten in the morning. I haven’t cried like this in months, let alone  _ever_  cried like this in front of another person, and I wouldn’t have expected it to hurt so much, to consume so much of my strength, but it’s also more liberating, more  _healing_  than any pill I’ve ever taken and any injection I’ve ever given myself. Something bad and ugly is flowing out of me with these tears, and something else deep inside of me is being cleansed, even though I don't understand what it is or how it is happening.

The longer it takes, the calmer my breathing becomes, and I feel him slowly collecting himself as well. He keeps holding on to my legs as if his life depended on it, but he’s stopped shaking, and his breathing has evened out to a normal rhythm again.

I wipe my face with the sleeve of my dressing gown and let my other hand, which is still resting on his head, slide to the nape of his neck. His skin is cool. The floor is not an ideal place to be sitting on this time of year, at least not for long.

“You’re freezing,” I say lowly.

He raises his head, and a hot sensation of pity flashes through me. He looks awful.

“You too. Please stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you’re feeling sorry for me. I don’t deserve your caring. I probably never did.”

He sounds so resigned that for a moment I'm afraid that this is it - that it's too late to fix this. His arm lets go of my legs and he gets up, his joints cracking. My hand slips off him and I rise as well, and we stand before each other like two strangers meeting for the very first time.

_What now?_

He looks at me and bites his lip, looking so helpless and lonely that it breaks my heart. But the rational part of my brain also understands that he’s right – the way I’ve been dealing with everything that happened to us is not the right one, and definitely not healthy. I still feel responsible for some of what brought us here, to this point in our relationship, and I know I’ll probably continue to do so for a while, but his words have opened my eyes to the part  _he_  played in keeping me down and locked up in feelings of guilt and shame that I didn’t deserve. At first I’m confused by what this realisation does to me, because I can’t put the feeling into words, but then it dawns on me – I'm allowed to stop hating myself.

I don’t know if that means I’ll have to hate  _him_  for what he did. I don’t think I could.

“I broke us, and I want to make it right again,” he says after a long silence, and I can tell he has to fight to hold my gaze. “But… I’ll understand if you want me to leave and never come back.”

I shake my head.

“I need some time to think,” I reply, and his face falls.

“Of course,” he murmurs, and although he tries to hide his disappointment, it’s still plain to see that he’s hoped for a different answer.

I wish I could take him into my arms – despite everything, this longing hasn’t stopped. I sigh.

“You misunderstand me, John. I need time to think, but we have to do this together if we want it to work out. There are too many things still unsaid.”

I take a deep breath, trying to clear my mind. I’m no longer used to making the rules. That Sherlock doesn't exist anymore.

“Go home and freshen up, pack some things, and come back. With Rosie. Please. I’d like you to stay for a while. We’ll need to--- I don’t know, to talk more, or to just be together for some time. I don’t know if it’ll work any other way.”

I feel awkward saying all this - opening up in this manner goes so severely against all my natural instincts of isolating myself from too much contact, of avoiding direct confrontation, of never admitting to having emotions.  _What have you done to me, John?_  

He closes his eyes for a second, his relief palpable.

“Thank you,” he breathes. “God,  _thank_  you.”

\---

He ends up staying for almost three weeks, and we do what we always do, which means tea and takeaways and clients and cases that the Yard can’t make head or tail of, but we also talk a lot, sometimes late into the night, with Rosie sleeping in her cot in John’s old bedroom, and a few times we leave Rosie with Mrs Hudson to go out for dinner, and there are no reporters and no awkward silences, just two friends getting to know each other again.

It’s going so well that I think that maybe this could be enough for me. We’re working through our past together now, and everything between us feels so much more solid than only two months ago. Maybe this is what it’s supposed to be.

I’m still in love with him. He doesn’t return the sentiment. That’s something I’ve gotten used to by now.

On the eighteenth day, I ask him to move back in with me.

\---

In November, we fight over the way I treated a client. He’s annoyed, pacing back and forth in front of me.

“You could have at least said sorry! She was all in tears when she left.”

I shrug. I don’t understand his problem.

“If she can’t handle me finding out about her own little secrets, she shouldn’t hire me to find out about somebody else’s.”

He sighs exasperatedly.

“I thought you had changed.”

Oh,  _did_  you.

“So? Did you think I’d stop being me just because I’m trying to get clean? Would you like me to abandon my personality along with my drug addiction? I’m sorry to break it to you, but that’s not going to happen.”

“Fine! Be  _you_. I just think you could show some compassion once in a while.”

“Compassion doesn’t help me work.”

“Suit yourself.”

He huffs and vanishes into the kitchen, and I’m on my way to the bathroom before I even register that I’m moving. My feet carry me to the medicine cabinet out of their own accord, and I open it. There’s my hidden compartment. There’s my little bag of pills. There’s my razor. I want to. I want to so badly.

_Stop. It’s just a fight. Not the end of the world. Stop, Sherlock._

I take the bag of pills and the razor and look at them. Holding them alone is already giving me a taste of the relief they could offer, and it’s sweet, so sweet.

_Stop. Please._

“John!”

I call out his name and walk to the kitchen to find him, my brain taking control and dragging my body along, and when I reach him, I put the items on the table in front of him. He’s about to make tea (what else?), but slowly lowers the kettle when he sees what I’ve brought him. His hand goes up to his mouth, where he holds it for a second before balling it into a fist and briefly closing his eyes.

_Anger?_

I stare at him, my heart pounding so loudly that I’m surprised he doesn’t have to shout when he finally looks at me and speaks.

“Sherlock. What--- Did you just use that?”

His voice sounds so soft. I thought he’d be mad. I shake my head.

“Alright. Good.” He swallows thickly. “Do you want me to take it away?”

I nod.

“Okay. I--- I’ll get rid of it, okay? Is there anything else in the flat right now?”

I shake my head again.

“Sherlock.” He steps closer and puts his hand on my arm, his eyes huge and full of wonder. “You’re so strong. Doing this--- It must have been so hard. Thank you.”

“I bought the pills on the day we went to Angelo’s. I never told you,” I hear myself say without meaning to. It just flows out of me, like a confession I’ve been waiting to make. “I was upset because you had a date and I thought you’d leave me again.”

_Stop it! You’re saying too much._

His gaze still fixed on me, he tightens his hold on my arm. Is he going to---

“I never took any,” I say quickly.

He presses his lips together and I can see that he’s controlling his breathing to stay calm. I'm not sure why he’s upset, though.

“Sherlock,” he finally says, and it sounds strained, but gentle. “Don’t look so scared. How can I be angry at you for almost falling back into old habits when I’m standing before you like this? All I wanted for a moment was to grab you and shake you and shout at you to get a grip. Why would I get so furious? Just because you were asking for my  _help?_  Do you see that mine’s an addiction, too? I’m not better than you. I’ll never attack you again if you slip. I promise, and I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”

He pulls at me then and I let him draw me into a slightly clumsy hug. I’m not sure what just happened, but it feels alright. Like one more step in the right direction.

“I was going to tell you… I’m starting therapy again on Monday,” he mumbles into my shoulder. “I don’t want to be like this anymore.”

I squeeze him briefly and then let him go. He smiles shyly when we part, and I give him a small grin.

“Have you made sure it’s a real one?” I ask.

He just snorts and rolls his eyes, then picks up the pills and the razor.

“I’ll go and lock these away. Make tea, would you?”

\---

It’s Monday night, and he returns from his appointment like a man who’s had a huge weight he’s been carrying lifted off his shoulders. He brings groceries that he bought on his way home and then cooks dinner while I work on some experiments, and later we eat and talk about nothing in particular, and then he does the dishes and I put Rosie to bed and read her a story.

When I get back to the living-room, he’s produced two small bowls of chocolate mousse out of nowhere and is waiting for me on the couch.

“Dessert?” he asks and holds out a spoon to me.

I take it and sit down next to him. We’re not using our chairs tonight. That’s new, but I like the closer proximity. Of course I do.

“Thank you,” I say. “I love chocolate mousse.”

He smirks.

“I know.”

He doesn’t say anything else, but I feel comfortable inside nonetheless. It’s nice, this quiet bit of domestic bliss, even though it’s only half of what  _could_  be if the world was a different one.

We eat in silence, and the sweetness of the chocolate in combination with the peace and calm of the scene lull me into a state of pleasant, almost meditative relaxation. I get so lost in it that I jump a little when he suddenly speaks again.

“I want to tell you something. I’ve never told anybody. I was going to tell my therapist today, but then I changed my mind. I want you to be the first to know.”

“Oh. Alright.”

I put my bowl away and turn towards him to show him that he’s got all my attention. He, however, doesn’t look into my eyes. He’s wringing his hands in his lap, giving off a strong air of nervousness.

“When I was eighteen, I was in love--- with a--- with another boy.”

My mouth goes dry.

_Oh. My God. John._

He’s talking to his knees, but his tone is determined – he really wants to get it off his chest, it seems. My heart, my brain, everything inside of me is going entirely and absolutely insane with shock, surprise, and a crazy sense of new hope, but on the outside I’m just  _there_ , listening. I’ll listen to him for as long as he wants me to.

“We--- we met on the rugby pitch. A few mates and I always played in the afternoons, and one of them brought him along one day. He was--- he was a beauty, so handsome – tall, dark hair,  _perfect_. Peter. I fell head over heels immediately. It was so confusing, because I’d never thought about another boy like that before. I’d had crushes before, but only on girls. I had made out a few times, fooled around a bit – you know. The usual.”

He laughs a small, quiet laugh, and in the curve of his smiling lips I can see the boy he was, thinking of his teenage love.

“We soon became friends and started to spend more time alone, just the two of us. He was smart and interesting, and we talked and talked for hours on end. It was better than with any girl I’d ever gone out with. And then, one night, we kissed. We’d gone swimming and it was late, the sun was almost gone, and I was nearly out of my mind from looking at his half-naked body all day, and suddenly he just pulled me against himself and  _kissed_  me. It was the best feeling in the world.”

He takes a deep breath and raises his head, and I have to stop myself from gasping when I see the look on his face. There’s despair, and longing, and the greatest sadness I’ve ever seen in his blue, blue eyes.

“We kept it a secret, of course – we knew what would happen if our friends, our parents, our small, boring town got wind of what we were doing. Harry had come out to my parents a year before that, and our father… He’d stopped talking to her,  _about_  her even. She’d moved out shortly afterwards, and that was that. Telling them that I was the same – it was unthinkable. But we managed. We met by the lake, in the woods, and sometimes his older brother gave him his car – no doubt he thought he needed it for rendezvous with girls. We just kissed, and talked. It was wonderful. He was the love of my life, or so I thought. I don’t know. Maybe he was.”

_John. John._

“My parents didn’t notice. And one day, they went out of town to visit my aunt. They were going to stay with her until the next day. I took him home that night, and we watched TV, and had a beer or two, and then I took him into my bed and we--- we made love.”

It sounds so innocent, the way he says it.  _We made love._  It makes me sad, because I think I know what’s coming, where this is leading.

“It was so good, the best thing that had ever happened to me. We did it again and again. We were so young, so crazy for each other. It was early morning when we fell asleep. And that was the mistake.”

_Oh no._

“When I woke up and heard my parents talking in the hall, I knew it was too late. My mother opened the door to my bedroom, and there we were, naked, smelling of sex – it was obvious. My father stayed completely silent until Peter had left. And then he started shouting. And when shouting wasn’t enough anymore, he used his fists. My mother was far too weak to stand up for me, so it just… it happened. And the blows didn’t even hurt that much – it was what he said that did it. If I was a faggot, I wouldn’t be his son anymore. He was ashamed of me. I was a disgrace. First my sister, and now I, his favourite. How could I do that to him?”

His voice falters, but he keeps his eyes on me.

“I stopped seeing Peter then. He tried to call, tried to talk to me, but I told him I couldn’t – that it was over. One night, he waited for me as I walked back from the pitch, and he tried to take my hand and pleaded with me to--- to at least  _think_  about it, and I--- I hit him then. I hit him and told him to fuck off.  _Sherlock._ ”

There are tears now, making a slow, transparent maze on his cheeks, and he sniffs before he continues.

“He never tried to talk to me again.”

My heart is aching for him, for his loss, and I’m not even jealous of this tall, dark boy who got to experience what I’ve been dreaming of for ages. This explains so much. I reach out and put my hand on his cheek, and he sobs and presses his face against my palm to get more contact.

“John, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”

There’s nothing else I can say to make him feel better – I’ve never been in a situation even remotely like that. My parents were helpless when it came to dealing with my sister, but they loved me and my siblings and always supported me in everything I did. I think they wouldn’t have cared who I was in love with, if I’d ever been in love.

“I’m not telling you this to make up an excuse for the way I deal with problems… for the way I use violence as a way to vent my anger,” he chokes out. “I just--- I wanted you to know.”

“It’s okay,” I say lowly, caressing his brow with my thumb, trying to smooth his pain away. “It’s going to be okay.”  

\---

At night, lying in my bed, I cry – for him, because he had to endure such heartache and hurt, and for me, because now that I know he’s been involved with another man before, it makes it even harder to accept that I’ll never get what I want. But he’s my friend. I want him to  _stay_  my friend, and I’ll work for it, even if it means I’ll lose him again someday. He’ll meet someone eventually, sooner or later, and fall in love again, and then he’ll leave for good.

But I’ll make good use of all the time I can get; I’ll enjoy his company for as long as I can – and maybe, if I’m lucky, I’ll be well again by the day he decides to go away, and I won’t fall as hard as the last time.

\---

The colder it gets outside, the warmer the atmosphere at 221B becomes – John’s therapist seems to be a miracle worker, and I’m so caught up in case work that my body barely has time to miss the kicks the drugs provided in the past.

I’m now allowed to spend time alone with Rosie, too, which makes me happier than I ever thought possible. For obvious reasons, I’ve never expected to be a father, and thus never entertained thoughts of what it would be like to care for, to  _love_  a child like I love her. She’s like my own daughter to me, and I’m already looking forward to showing her the world as I see it – when she’s older, of course, and minus the dead people.

We haven’t had another fight yet, apart from small arguments over who should be getting the milk, or the pros and cons of putting assorted body parts in the fridge, or me forgetting to eat when the solving of a case is imminent. But those are  _good_  fights, because they remind me of what it used to be like at the beginning, and they happen without venom or fear or John clenching his jaw. They’re just us being ourselves around each other, which is all I’ve ever wanted. Living together is an experiment, but so far I like the results.

\---

We spend Christmas Morning with Mrs Hudson, who gives Rosie a stuffed crocodile “to remind you of your uncle Mycroft”, and I’m still laughing about that when noon has come and gone and it’s only the three of us again.

We’re sitting on the couch, Rosie spread out on my chest, snoring lightly and drooling on my shirt, and John looks at me and smiles.

“This almost felt like family, didn’t it?” he asks and bites into one of Mrs Hudson’s famous Christmas biscuits. The powdered sugar covering it dusts his lips, making him look like something I could eat if I was allowed to. He continues, oblivious to my thoughts ( _thank God_ ): “The only one missing was  _uncle Mycroft_.”

I snort. Lowly, so as not to wake Rosie, I say: “I’m sure he’ll show up eventually to say Merry Christmas. Ever since our little family gathering in Sherrinford, he’s lost his sharp edges, I’m afraid.”

John grins, but it looks affectionate. He knows that I don’t mean it. Mycroft made mistakes when he allowed our sister to spend time with Moriarty, but I’ll never forget what he tried to do when he thought I had to pick between him and John.

“Is she getting heavy?” he asks me, pointing at Rosie. “Come on, I’ll put her in her cot.”

He gets up and bends over me to take his daughter in his arms, but I hold up my hand to stop him. It comes to rest on his chest for a moment, and I hope he doesn’t notice me shiver at the contact.

“No, it’s okay. It’s quite pleasant, actually. If you don’t mind, I’d like to keep her a little longer.”

He looks into my eyes, his face full of something tender and soft that I can’t put my finger on, and nods. “Okay,” he says quietly, but doesn’t move away. We stare at each other for a long, long moment, which is only broken by the sound of footsteps on the stairs.

_Flawless timing, brother mine._

“Speaking of the devil,” I whisper, my eyes still fixed on his.

He licks his lips and then sighs. He’s so close that I can feel the little puff of air on my cheeks and smell the ginger and sugar and black tea on his breath.

“Yes,” he whispers back.

I watch him as he straightens up and prepares to open the door, all the while wondering if I only imagined the note of regret in his tone.     

\---

It happens a few times more in the week that follows, but it’s never so obvious that I could describe what exactly it is that leaves me so unsettled and churned up inside afterwards.

I notice John’s eyes lingering on me when I’m not looking – maybe I’m bending over the microscope, or sitting with Rosie and humming a song for her, or just going through case files at my desk, and I feel his gaze brushing me and want to return it, want it so much, but he always seems to be just turning or looking away when I try, and he never lets on that he’s been staring after all.

We live together in relatively close quarters, so bumping into each other from time to time is nothing new, but it happens so much more often these days that I’m starting to wonder. I try not to let it affect me, but it becomes harder and harder to ignore what this fleeting contact, this soft brushing of skin against skin, does to me, and I’m using the word “harder” here for a reason.

If I didn’t know better, I’d deduce that he’s showing signs of romantic attraction, but John is, unfortunately, one of the very few people I can’t trust myself to deduce. Maybe he’s the only one. He’s always been the special one for me, and this doesn’t stop at my ability, or lack thereof, to confidently tell what he’s thinking.

When he and Rosie leave the flat to go to the shops in the late afternoon of New Year’s Eve, I sit down in front of my laptop and slide Mary’s last message into my external CD drive. I can’t bear watching her on the big screen; it’s too early for that. But I need to listen to her again and remember what it was that she said about John. If you don’t count me, she was the one who knew him best, and right now I could do with a bit of advice as to how to proceed.

Seeing her smiling face gives me a pang. I turn up the volume and lean back.

_Help me._

\---

After watching the whole video, I sit there for a long time, pondering her words. Why must you be so cryptic, Mary?

It’s no good.

I need to do something about the restless feeling in my chest, so I decide to go for a walk. I don’t even know why the urge to visit her grave has become so big all of a sudden.

I write John a message, throw on my coat and scarf, and leave.

\---

Only later will it occur to me that I forgot to put away the DVD.

MISS YOU

\---

“Hello, Mary.”

It’s ridiculous. I’m talking to a cold block of stone that marks a hole in the ground that holds the lifeless, decaying remains of a person I used to know. She’s not going to hear me. But I needed to get closer to her, closer to my memories of what she was, and this is the closest I’ll ever get. She’s gone, and her being gone is the reason why I’ll never get the answer I need –  _and_  the reason why I’m able to ask the question in the first place.

“Mary. I… I hope you’re doing fine, wherever you are. I---  _God_ , that’s insane. I need to ask you about your message. You said you--- You said John and I could become…  _something_ , but you never said what. I need to know what you were implying. I need to know if I’m allowed to--- Mary, I liked you too. You--- knew that, at least I  _hope_  you did… even though you had what I wanted for myself. I think you noticed. You were so smart. And you loved him, so you understand. You understand what it’s like to love him, and you wanted us to be friends… Did you know what would---  _could_  happen if--- if you ever had to leave? Would you allow me to try? Mary… I  _need_  to know if it’s alright, if I can go and try---”

“You can.”

The voice, the  _oh so familiar_  voice, rips me out of my half-whispered monologue, and I turn around with a start.

John.

His expression is filled with grief and hope and determination, and I can read all of that, but I can’t put the pieces together so that they make sense.

“I know Mary, and she would tell you that you can,” he says.

I swallow.  _Oh God._  I can’t speak, can’t even move, and he just looks at me and starts walking until he’s right in front of me.

“You  _can_ ,” he repeats. "And I  _want_  you to."

We’re so close now that our fronts are almost touching, and I still haven’t managed to utter a single sound. He doesn’t seem to be waiting for an answer, so I hope that it’s okay. My mind is frozen in place, a phenomenon that only ever occurs when he is around.

Well.

I suppose that this is what love does to people?

He stares into my eyes and cups my face in his hands, his fingertips sliding along my temples and into my hair, and I can only shudder in response. I don’t know what to do with my own hands, so I rest them on his sides, just above his hips. There’s skin and muscle and flesh underneath all of his clothes, and I want to feel all this without the barriers of fabric – but not here, of course, not like this.

How does one progress from  _here_  to… more?

He licks his lips, and from the rapid movements of his eyes I can tell that he’s studying my face. It makes me feel self-conscious, but at the same time I’m awestruck by the intensity of the moment. He’s looking at me as if I was the most fascinating being in the universe, and this is something I’ve never experienced before. His touch is gentle and careful, but it sets all my nerves alight with a blazing desire for things I don’t understand and don’t know how to ask for.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispers and runs his thumbs along my cheekbones.

I blink and shake my head, my cheeks brushing his warm palms, but before I can protest, he gets on his toes and silences me with a long, soft kiss. It’s only his lips pressing against mine, and then barely a hint of tongue and teeth grazing my lower lip when he pulls away again, but it’s more than I could ever have imagined it to be. I always thought that the “jolts of electricity” people describe when they talk about first kisses were a cliché, an exaggeration, but now I see that I was wrong. This first contact  _is_  electric, it’s pure energy flowing from his body into mine, and for a second I’m immeasurably sad that years and years of my life had to go by before I was allowed to feel this.

“ _Shut up._  You’re so fucking beautiful that I don’t even have the words to describe it, so just shut up and let me say it, okay?” he mutters. “You’ll just have to accept that for once,  _I’m_  the one who observes.”

His arms come down to slip around my waist, and he hugs me and nuzzles his face against my neck. I look at the sky, afraid of my legs giving way, and inhale the scent of his hair along with the cold evening air. My heart is pounding against my ribs, and I’m sure he can feel it.

“Sherlock,” he says, his voice muffled by my scarf. “Let me take you home.”

\---

“Where’s---  _oh_  God--- Where’s Rosie?”

We have made it into the flat, but only just. The moment we crossed the threshold, he had me pinned against the wall, and he made short work of my coat and scarf, which are now pooling at my feet.

I can barely speak, my mind racing and trying to process what’s going on, and his hands and lips all over me make it impossible to concentrate. He stops devouring my ear for a moment and breathes into it instead, a low chuckle rumbling from his chest, and I know I’ll faint if the rest of what we’re about to do is only remotely as intense. What is happening to me?

“Mrs Hudson says she’ll take her for a few hours so that we can go out and celebrate New Year’s. But to be honest I think she knows perfectly well that we’re not going  _anywhere_ ,” he murmurs, his voice full of promises for the rest of the “few hours” that we have on our own. I wish I knew how to decipher this code, but I don’t.

What I do know is that I want to feel him closer, so I pull his jacket off his shoulders and try to slip it off his arms, and he moans and helps me, his mouth never leaving the side of my face, my cheekbone, the edge of my jaw.

“God, you smell so good…” he then groans and buries his nose in my neck. “Your hair, your skin… I want you so much…”

I’m shaking in his arms, and we haven’t even started yet, so I deem it necessary to remind him of the fact that this is new for me.

“John, I--- I’m overwhelmed… I don’t know how---“

“Sherlock,” he interrupts me, kissing my Adam’s apple. “Do you like this?”

This simple question seems to be exactly what I need to help me focus, and I realise that yes, I do. I do like it. It’s the best thing I’ve ever felt.

“Yes…” I rasp back and dig my fingers into his back, and he hums and pushes his whole body up and against me to grind our hips together.

My head falls back against the wall and I moan rather loudly, which makes him laugh breathlessly.

“ _Yeah_ … me too, Sherlock… and before we continue, know this… If you say the word, I’ll stop… no matter what we’re doing at the time… It’s all up to you tonight… I’ll guide you for as long as you want it… And if it gets too much, you’ll let me know… okay?”

His tongue flicks my earlobe and his hardness presses against mine through four layers of clothing.

I trust him, and I want this – my body is screaming for it, even as my brain protests because I’m letting my guard down in every possible way.

I nod.

“Okay…”

He grazes the line of my neck with his teeth, and I’m so busy dealing with this divine sensation that I completely miss how his fingers pop open the button of my trousers. Only when he pulls down the zipper do I catch up with events, but he’s already halfway on his knees by then.   

“Hmmm…  _Please_  tell me you’re clean, Sherlock…”

There are more romantic things one could say while undressing a new lover, but the way he pushes and pulls my trousers down my legs and tongue-kisses every inch of newly exposed skin in the process, even the gnarly, hideous scars on my thighs, makes up for it.

“Yes… I got tested… Molly insisted.”

I sound breathless and insecure, not very much like myself, but it’s alright. Tonight he’ll take the lead, and I’ll follow.

“ _Bless_  her…” he sighs and caresses the backs of my legs with long strokes, his nose pressed into the soft spot where my right leg meets my groin.  _So_  close to where I need him most. “Because I need to taste you now… all of you… oh _God_ …”

He’s panting, and I have to prop my hands against the wall to steady myself. His fingers hook themselves under the waistband of my boxers and he pulls them down with one smooth movement, and as soon as my penis springs free he presses his lips against its underside to lick, suck, and kiss along my whole length. My knees buckle and I have to close my eyes. I’ve changed my mind. It’s  _not_  alright. This is too much, too fast, and my body and mind aren’t ready for it yet.

“ _John_ ,” I gasp. “I can’t---”

I don’t exactly know  _what_  I can’t – bear this? Keep upright if he continues? Comprehend what it does to me to feel him like this?

“Look at me,” he says lowly, his hot breath brushing my now wet flesh, and I shiver and obey.

I incline my head to look at him, and he gazes up at me so longingly that my heart misses a beat. No one has ever looked at me like this.

“You’re delicious… I just want a taste… I promise I won’t go too fast…” he whispers.

Not taking his eyes off me, he licks a slow, deft stripe up to the head of my erection and then takes me into his hand to guide me into his mouth. I inhale sharply, already feeling lightheaded. He smiles around me and uses the tip of his tongue to tease my frenulum,  _good God!_ , and I feel myself twitch and leak a drop of Cowper’s fluid. I wince in apology – this must be disgusting for him. But no. His lids flutter and he moans, the vibrations of his voice giving me new heights of pleasure still, and sucks harder as if to savour my taste.

“Oh  _God_ \---” I groan, and then my legs really give way.

He catches me as I sink down to my knees in front of him, and I hide my face in the crook of his neck. I’m so embarrassed. His hands rub my back and he kisses my temple, and for a moment we just stay like that, and I breathe him in and try to calm down.

“Let’s go to the bedroom,” he eventually says and caresses my shoulders. “It’ll be more comfortable…”

I nod, but don’t look up yet. I thought I could act more self-confident in this situation, but it’s more difficult than I thought. My fantasies were exactly that – fantasies. Fabrications that my brain came up with as substitutes for the real thing. But I never expected the real thing to be so much… like  _this_.

He hugs me then, tightly, and I know that he’s looking right though me.

“We’ll go at your speed, Sherlock,” he murmurs into my ear. “We don’t have to do anything tonight. I just want to be with you. Is that okay?”

I nod again, but realise that he can’t read my mind – I have to tell him what distresses me so.

“Losing control… It’s something I’m not good at,” I whisper. “But please don’t think I don’t want you to do--- these things to me. I  _do_.”

A shudder runs through him and he holds me a bit tighter.

“Sherlock… I’ve been thinking of having you like this for weeks now. All I want is to be close to you, to make you feel good… I’ll lose myself doing that, at least sometimes, and it’s alright if you lose yourself, too. I want you to know that. I know you hate being not in control, I do… and you can always tell me if it gets too much. But… you’re safe with me. Please believe me. You can let go, because I’ll always catch you.”

I can’t answer, since my throat is suddenly feeling very tight. He chuckles weakly, and there’s a hint of tears in his voice, too.

“Fuck. Now I’ve almost made myself cry,” he jokes. “I swear I’m usually not that soft in bed – it’s you who’s doing that to me.”

His choice of words makes me grin, and I feel better immediately. Light banter comes more naturally to me than making out against the wall. For now. I'm nothing if not a willing learner.

“From where I’m sitting, it looks as if you’re far from  _soft_ ,” I reply and slide my hand between his legs to cup his still prominent erection in my palm. He exhales loudly and nips the shell of my ear, giving me goose bumps all over my back. “And we’re not in bed yet, so it doesn’t count,” I add, feeling bolder by the second, whereupon he laughs and puts his fingers in my hair to ruffle it.

“Lead the way,” he says, and I decide that this half-amused, half-husky drawl is now my new favourite version of his voice. “Your bedroom or mine?”

\---

We opt for his bedroom in the end, because the walls and floors are thin and Mrs Hudson and Rosie are just below our feet, reading picture books, and also because he informs me that there are certain things we might be needing to make our endeavours more enjoyable, and he's got those in the drawer of his bedside table. Always prepared, this John Watson is.

I've seen movies of an explicit nature, so I know what he's talking about, and it shouldn't alarm me, really - I've been thinking about this for years, and in my head I've already done it all to him and had him do all of it to me.

Why am I so nervous?

When we enter his room I'm already partially undressed, my trousers, boxers, shoes, and socks littering the hallway floor, and he notices me shiver and grins.

"Let's get out of these clothes and under the covers, hm?"

He pulls his jumper over his head along with the t-shirt he's wearing underneath, and seeing him in his jeans only does indescribable things to me. His sun-shaped scar is huge and stands out clearly against the rest of his unblemished skin, but it’s not ugly. It shows what he did for others. It’s the thing that brought him to me. No longer feeling silly in my expensive silk shirt and nothing else, I pull him against me and let my hands roam over his naked back while I press a soft, but determined kiss against the place where the bullet entered his body.

"Mmhhh..."

He not only allows me to do this, but moves into my kiss and uses the little space left between us to unbutton my shirt until we're finally able to feel each other skin on skin for the very first time.

It's marvellous.

"God, you're gorgeous, Sherlock," he pants and kisses along my collar bone. "So beautiful..."

I ignore the blood rushing in my ears at his words and reach down to open the fly of his jeans. He's so hard, and bigger than I've imagined him, and when I mirror his actions from before and go down on my knees to remove both his jeans and his pants (midnight blue, tight,  _so_  enticing) in one go, he utters a wordless sound of longing that goes straight to my heart.

"Oh God, oh God," he sighs when in put my hands on his legs and stroke upwards until I reach his groin.

My thumbs slide into the creases of his thighs and I listen to his quiet gasps and take him in.

His skin is smooth and golden, and his penis and scrotum are of a slightly darker, more brownish colour. He's quite long and thicker than I am, and I suppose you could call him beautiful. He's curving upwards from a nest of blond curls, and his tip is already glistening with moisture.

I raise my head and find him looking down at me from under half-closed lids, and it's plain to see that he wants it,  _now_ , but is reining himself in to not scare me away.

"John," I whisper and wrap my fingers around him to give him a long, careful stroke, and he inhales audibly and puts his hand on my head to card his fingers through my hair.

He pulls lightly, and I smile and press my lips against the base of his penis to breathe across his silky skin.

"Ah, yes," he hisses, his fingers tightening their grip on my hair. " _Mmhhh._ "

He smells wonderful, very masculine, and I try to memorise it all and file it away even as I flick him with my tongue to taste him for the first time.

He gasps and his legs start to shake.

 _Please_ , he mouths, but no sound comes out.

I decide to stop teasing then and lick upwards once before taking him into my mouth as deeply as I can. He tastes sharp and slightly bitter and is so, so warm. It’s a powerful feeling to have him inside of me like this, and I keep looking at him and suck lightly to intensify it.

"O-ohhh," he moans and holds the back of my head, not pushing me, but clearly fighting not to. "Oh God...  _Sherlock_..."

Remembering what his voice did to me earlier, I growl lowly and revel in the groans of pleasure he gives me in response and the bucking of his hips against my face.

"Mmh,  _sorry_ ," he then mutters and brushes some stray locks of hair off my forehead to better see my eyes. “You’re amazing… Forgot myself a little there…”

I swirl my tongue around him once more and then let him slide out slowly.

“It’s alright… You can let go, you know… I like it…” I tell him.

I’m a little out of breath.

He smiles the most radiant smile then and pulls me to my feet to kiss me.

“If I had let go just now, I’d have finished before we’d even made it to the bed. We can’t have that,” he says against my lips when we part again.

We laugh when he tries to step out of his jeans and pants while simultaneously kicking off his shoes and almost stumbles in the process, and I shrug off my shirt and throw it behind myself, not caring where it comes to land. He pulls off his socks and then steps in front of me again to press his whole body against mine. We hug, and he holds me very tight.

“Finally,” he breathes against my sternum and kisses the place where my heart is beating as if it wanted to burst out of my chest. “Sherlock…  _finally_.”

For a moment the mood changes into something almost reverent, the urgent lust from before shifting into a slower, more languid longing that burns between us and makes us melt into each other as if we could become one if we only tried hard enough.

“I love you, John,” I whisper, because now seems to be the exact right time to say it. “I’ve loved you forever.”

He holds me tighter still.

“I love you,” he replies. “I wish I’d admitted it to myself sooner.”

I put my cheek on his head and close my eyes. This is a dream. How can it be that I have everything I want now? I don’t know how to handle this scale of happiness, because I’ve never been this happy before. My brain wants to shut down and reboot.

He slides his hands down my back and then cups my behind in his palms to knead my cheeks. The breath I was about to exhale comes out as a stuttering sigh. He looks up and I see that his eyes have turned a deep, dark blue.

“The bed, Sherlock.  _Now._ ”

\---

I had planned to explore, to  _participate_  more this first time, but as soon as we’re lying on the bed he’s upon me like a whirlwind, like a wild creature, taking coherent thought, speech and movement away from me by kissing and touching me in ways and places I didn’t expect and can’t explain.

He’s not shy about voicing his desire and telling me exactly what he’s going to do to me, now or sometime in the future, what my body looks like, what it does to him.  _Want you, so sexy, want to be inside you, want your beautiful cock inside me, God, yes, you’re driving me crazy…_ He’s very vocal, which I love. I’m not sure I could say these things myself, at least not for now, but hearing him praise me like that, so raw and unadorned, is like another level of sex itself.

He kisses every scar on my back, whispering that I’m beautiful and strong and so brave, and, weirdly enough, it doesn’t feel like atonement. It feels like worship.

When he rolls me onto my back and spreads my legs to put his head between them, my breath stops for a second. He’s kissing me where no one has ever touched me before, and it's so forbidden, so  _dirty_ , that I can’t believe it’s really happening.

“Oh  _God_ ,” I moan. “John!”

He licks around my opening and then looks up, panting.

“Is this okay?” he asks in a hoarse voice.

I shake my head.

“I--- I don’t know! I--- Are you sure---“

He rubs the insides of my thighs, slowly, and I can tell he’s trying to get me to relax.

“I love doing this… If you let me, I’ll do it every night…”

_Oh._

“I want to feel and taste every part of you, Sherlock… It turns me on so much to be allowed to do this to you. Can I show you?”

_Oh, God._

I close my eyes.

“Yes… show me…”

He moans and goes back to what he was doing before, and with each stroke of his hot, soft tongue I feel myself enjoy it more. The sounds he makes are a clear indication that he does love doing this, and I love it, too, and it’s okay. It’s more intimate than anything we’ve done so far, and that’s what scares me so, but it’s also connecting us so much more deeply than we’ve ever been before, which is almost painful in how good it feels.

“Mmmhhhh…” he hums and pushes the tip of his tongue inside me, and I have to hold on to the headboard of his bed to keep myself grounded.

“It feels so  _good_ ,” I hear myself say, and he makes a content sound in the back of his throat.

Then he lets go of me and nips the skin of my scrotum with his lips, and I feel how one of his fingers replaces his tongue to lightly brush, circle and  _press_.

“In my drawer,” he whispers. “Small blue tube. Can you get it, please?”

I have to concentrate to understand what he wants from me, but eventually the details click together in my head and I reach out and open the drawer of his bedside table to find the required item and hand it to him.

“Thanks, love.”

Him using that particular term of endearment while his finger is doing  _this_  to me is strange and wonderful, and I lean back again to get comfortable, listening to the click of a plastic lid. His finger leaves me, and out of their own accord my hips jerk upwards to follow. He huffs affectionately.

“ _Patience_ … I’ll be ready in a second… got to warm it up a bit…” He looks at me and grins almost predatorily. “You’ll want to hold on to something again,” he adds, and his voice seems to have dropped an octave.

I take a deep breath and grip the headboard again.

He throws the tube of lubricant aside and settles down between my legs again.

“Up,” he says lowly and lifts my thighs to that they get pushed up against my abdomen. “Yes, like that…”

His finger is back, but it’s wet and slick now, which makes every touch feel ten times more intense. He circles my opening like he did with his tongue, and then slips only his fingertip inside.

“ _Oh_ …”

It’s burning, but in a good way, and I can’t help but push down and onto his hand because I want more, fast,  _now_. He complies immediately and presses into me until he’s embedded up to his knuckle. His breathing grows heavy.

“Oh, you’re so hot inside… God, it’s so good…”

He pulls out and pushes in again, and I have to bite my lip to keep myself from screaming. It’s  _so_  good.

“More,” I sigh. “ _Please_ …”

He growls and does as I say, thrusting his finger in and out again and again, giving me more, faster, a little deeper, and just when I think I can’t take it anymore because the pleasure is just too much, he pulls away almost completely and then returns with a second finger joining the first.

“Ah!” I moan and look down to see my penis spurt out a small streak of transparent fluid. “John… I’m going to---“

He hums and crooks his fingers to brush a spot inside of me that sets my whole body alight with lust. I whine and throw my head back against the pillow.

_Oh God!_

“No, you’re not… It just feels like it,” he says. “I’ll make you feel even  _better_ … before I let you come…”

He presses against my prostate again and I see stars. Yes, I’ve read about this. I’ve looked at anatomy books and watched internet porn to try and understand what, where, and how, but I never had the nerve to try and look for it on myself. And it’s so much more than I’ve ever felt; it’s like orgasming, but without coming down from the peak.

He scissors his fingers inside of me, stretching me, sending jolts of ecstasy through my nerves again and again, and suddenly I know that I want more.  _More._  

“ _Please_ , John… I want--- oh  _God!_ \--- I want you  _inside_ , please…”

His movements falter, but he takes up his rhythm again after a second.

“ _Fuck_ , Sherlock… Are you sure?”

His tone says  _yes, God, I want you, I want to put myself inside of you_ , and I’m touched that he asks to reassure himself, but there’s no time, because I’ll go  _insane_  if he doesn’t do it, and soon.

“Yes, please…  _please_ …”

“Oh God,  _yes_ ,” he moans and gets up on his knees. “Oh God, Sherlock…”

He grabs my legs with one arm and pulls them up against his chest so that my feet come to frame his head.

“You’re beautiful like this…” he tells me and slips a third finger in on the next thrust.

I shudder around the intrusion, but my body is alright with it, pulling him in, eager for more, and deeper.

“Yeah… Oh God, where’s the lube…”

He looks around himself with a tinge of panic in his voice, but then he finds the tube and laughs.

“You drive me wild, Sherlock…” he says, serious again, and I hear him slick himself up with a few quick strokes.

I swallow, remembering his size, and he looks at me and kisses the inside of my left ankle.

“I’ll go slow…”

I nod.

He gives me a few more thrusts with his hand and then pulls out, quickly replacing his fingers with the head of his penis, probably to take advantage of how stretched I am right now. It feels like too much, but I still want more. He's so---

He pushes forwards and I stop thinking.

In, in,  _in_ , slowly, so excruciatingly slowly, and he’s bigger and much more  _there_  than his fingers were, but it’s good, it’s more than good, it’s  _John_ , inside of me.

“Oh God, baby,  _oh_ …” he groans, and suddenly his hips are pressing against my body, and he’s all the way inside.

_Oh God. John. John._

We look at each other for a while, not moving at all, and I know I’ll never forget this moment.

“My love,” he whispers and takes my legs to arrange them around his middle, and at first I don’t know what’s happening, but then he lowers himself onto me to prop his elbows up to the left and right of me and slides his chest against mine. “I want you closer,” he adds and slightly shifts his hips to push his spread thighs under my lower body, which feels incredible. The new angle is  _perfect_.

" _John_ ," I groan and he smiles and leans in for a long, deep kiss.

He sucks on my tongue and then on my lower lip, swiping his own tongue across it before letting go with a smacking sound,  and then begins a slow and steady rhythm of in and out, keeping his thrusts shallow, and somehow he knows exactly how to hit my most sensitive spots with each and every one of them.

It's not only the exquisite pressure of him moving inside of me anymore, but now, with him on top of me like that, his body also keeps rubbing against the underside of my penis with every thrust of his hips, and both sensations combined are so intensely pleasurable that I don't know how to breathe anymore.

I gasp, I moan, I hold on to his back like a drowning man, and he's my centre now, my lifeline; everything I feel is revolving around him.

"Oohhhh...  _yes_... so good... so  _tight_ , my love..." he murmurs into my ear as he moves and pants against my cheek and digs his fingers into my shoulders for leverage. " _Fuck_ , this is heaven... Making love to you... it's  _heaven_..."

He's right. It is. But somehow I sense that he's holding back, that he’s still so careful not to hurt me, and I love him for that – but I also want him to enjoy this with every fibre of his being, and maybe there’s more he wants to do, but he's afraid to overwhelm me with it.

I slide my hands into his hair, then to the nape of his neck, and he shivers violently and presses his lips against my temple.

“Sherlock… _mmmhhh_ …”

I put my heels against the small of his back and buck into his next thrust, and he moans in surprise as it drives him into me, deeper and harder than before. There’s a bit of pain when his loins slam against my behind, but I can feel _everything_ , from the pulsing of his length inside of me to the way his testicles draw up against his body, tightening in preparation for his climax, and it makes up for it a thousandfold.

“Sherlock---“ he gasps. “Sorry!”

I lick along the shell of his ear and run my nails down his spine, enjoying the sobbing, shaky groan that escapes him as I do so.

“Don’t hold back,” I tell him. “I feel you holding back… I want you to let go… Please, John, _let go_ …”

“ _Nngghhh_ ,” he grunts. “You--- _okay?_ ”

He’s reduced to fragments of speech, and I want the animal inside of him to come out; I want to hear and see him come undone on top of me – I want to be the reason for it.

“Yes,” I pant. “ _Yes!_ ”

His hands come up to hold my head and his next thrust is hard, deep, and I can feel how taut his abdomen has become with the effort of it. My erection rubs against him, tightly trapped in the space between our bodies, which is by now slick with sweat and pre-ejaculate, and when he does it again and again, finding a new rhythm, I feel it build up inside of me.

_I’m going to come. John is making me come. Oh God, oh John, John, John…_

He keeps going harder, _harder_ , and the sounds he makes are almost enough to send me over the edge. There are no words anymore, only deep groans and heavy breathing, and his grip on my hair is tighter now, pulling at my curls.

It’s _so_ good, my whole body is on fire, and from the way he swells and throbs inside of me I can tell that he’s not far behind.

“ _John!_ ” I press my face against his neck when it takes me, my voice breaking with the relief of this orgasm, which is stronger than anything I’ve ever felt before. “ _Ngh!_ ”

I release myself in several long spurts, and the hot liquid gets smeared all over our chests as he continues to pound into me with all the strength he’s got left. My legs start to shake, but I keep them wrapped around him. I want to feel it happen to him.

“Sherlock, ah--- _ah!_ ” he suddenly moans, and a long shudder runs through him. “ _Mh!_ ”

His movements grow more urgent still, and then become erratic, and then he’s there as well.

He’s completely silent when he reaches his peak, even seems to stop breathing for two, three heartbeats, but his whole body spasms in my arms and his hips pump into me with every wave that shakes him. It’s an alien sensation to feel him fill me up with his release, but not unpleasant, and I’m sure the feeling of absolute connectedness it gives me will make up for any potential discomfort it might cause later on.

After thrusting through the aftershocks, he eventually stills and just sinks down onto me with his full weight, and I wrap him in my arms, my legs still slung around his lower body. We’re both breathing fast, and there doesn’t seem to be enough oxygen left in the room to quench our thirst for air.

“Fuck,” he mutters after a minute or two. “ _Fuck._ ”

“Yes,” I agree, my voice hoarse and raspy. “Yes, indeed.”

He looks up then and smiles, his eyes heavy-lidded and slightly glassy, and we meet in a soft, languid kiss.

“I love you,” he mumbles against my lips. “I love you, I love you.”

My heart’s so full that I can’t answer. I just kiss him again, and again. I’ll never let him go again.

We only break the kiss when one of my legs starts to cramp and I have to put it back on the mattress to ease the pain.

“Sorry, love…” he whispers and slowly pulls away and out of me.

I feel empty when he’s gone, and his sperm trickling out of me is, as expected, a strange and slightly uncomfortable sensation. He’s kneeling between my legs now, watching me, and when our eyes meet, he reaches down and runs his hand through the cooling liquid gathering around my opening. My over-sensitive nerves send a jolt of pleasure to my now softening penis, like an echo of what has just transpired, and it twitches weakly against my hip. He licks his lips.

“You’re so beautiful like this,” he murmurs. “The most sensual, sexy thing I’ve ever seen. If I could, I’d take you all over again now.”

I’m still mostly lost for words, but I force myself to grin tiredly and caress his knee, which is the only part of him I can reach at the moment.

“I’ve lost track of time, but I’m afraid our little tête-á-tête is nearing its end,” I reply.

He smiles and makes to get up.

“Stay here. I’ll clean you up.”

\---

He cleans both of us up with a flannel and a bowl of warm water, and I’m thankful for his initiative, because my limbs are not entirely cooperative yet.

When he’s finished, he goes and collects my shoes, socks, pants, and trousers, and then helps me to get dressed before putting his own clothes back on. He sees me wince when I sit down on the bed to tie my shoelaces and mirrors the expression.

“Sorry… It’ll feel like that for a while.”

I had gathered as much. But there’s no need for him to apologise. Not for this kind of pain.

“Let me assure you – it was worth it,” I say drily.

He laughs, but then something serious and monumental shows up in his gaze. He steps in front of me and takes my face in his hands to look into my eyes, the smile fading from his lips.

“This was an honour,” he says lowly. “To be allowed to take this, to have you sharing it with me. I don’t deserve it.”

I open my mouth to answer, to tell him no, you _do_ , but he puts his finger on my lips before I can make a sound.

“I’ll be feeling like this for some time, and it’s okay,” he says. “Thank you for taking the first steps with me today, Sherlock.”

I nod. I know what he means, and I suppose he’s right. We’ll both be feeling like this for some time, and yes, it is okay. I wonder if we’d be here today, like this, if everything that’s haunting us hadn’t happened. All I know is that we’ll deal with it, together, and that it will be alright.

We’re _us_ again, after all this time.

\---

Mrs Hudson appears half an hour later, carrying Rosie on her hip, and I’m glad that we look presentable again. Rosie looks sleepy, but content, and I’m filled with a sudden wave of affection for our landlady. It’s so good that she is here, not only for Rosie, but also for the two of us. We probably don’t thank her enough.

John seems to be thinking the same, because he takes his daughter from her and gives her to me instead and then goes and hugs Mrs Hudson as if they hadn’t seen each other for ages. She giggles and returns his embrace, and when John lets her go, her cheeks have turned a light shade of pink.

“There, there, John,” she says and pats his hand. “It’s alright.”

John smiles and walks towards the kitchen, motioning for us to join him. We trail after him, and he opens the fridge and takes out a bottle.

“I’ve bought champagne,” he says. “Will you stay to say Happy New Year, Mrs Hudson? Since your timing’s so perfect?”

I look at the clock on the wall and realise it’s seven minutes to midnight. Mrs Hudson chuckles.

“Oh, don’t mind if I do! Talking about timing, though – I first tried it around eleven, because Rosie woke up and seemed to want her daddy, but you boys sounded like you weren’t finished then, so we went back downstairs.”

John almost drops the glasses he was about to put on the table. I almost drop Rosie.

Mrs Hudson frowns and flaps her hands in a gesture of impatience.

“Oh, shush! Don’t look so abashed! I told you we’ve got all sorts here. And it took you some bloody long time!”

I’m so happy Rosie can’t speak yet. I hope this means she also doesn’t _understand_. I know my face is red – my cheeks are _burning_. It’s funny, because John is white. Not pale. _White._

Mrs Hudson shakes her head.

“Oh, for God’s sake. Give me the bottle. I’ll pour the champagne, or we’ll miss it.”

\---

We manage to clink glasses the exact same second the church bells begin to ring in the new year, and we laugh and drink and kiss Mrs Hudson’s cheeks and Rosie’s forehead, and after a brief moment of hesitation we kiss each other, too, on the lips, and Mrs Hudson coos, and Rosie holds on to my shirt and leans her head against my chest.

It’s going to be alright, everything, in the end. This year will be different. We’re Mary’s Baker Street Boys again.

But we’re also so much _more_.  

_The end._


End file.
